ANOTHER MAJOR BLOW TO THE RADICAL GREEN AGENDA!
The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals on Tuesday delivered another stinging rebuke to the Biden-era Department of Energy’s war on American appliances, setting aside energy efficiency standards for stoves and cooktops.
The court ruled on Tuesday that the Department of Energy (DOE) acted completely illegally when it refused to withdraw a controversial “Direct Final Rule” after multiple red states raised damning objections.
The radical green zealots in Washington have been waging a non-stop war on everyday household appliances. From dishwashers to ceiling fans, bureaucrats inside the Biden regime spent years pushing stringent rules designed to make basic home appliances more expensive, less efficient, and far less reliable.
When CPSC Commissioner Richard Trumka Jr. let the cat out of the bag in 2023 by suggesting a total federal ban on gas stoves, the public pushback was immediate and fierce.
Unable to pass their radical climate tyranny through normal transparent channels, DOE bureaucrats tried an illegal end-run around the American public.
Rather than facing the public in standard notice-and-comment rulemaking, the DOE tried to quietly lock in new efficiency standards using a backdoor mechanism known as a “Direct Final Rule” (DFR).
In a decision written by Judge Andrew Oldham and joined by Judges Catharina Haynes and James Ho, the panel granted the petition for review filed by Mississippi, Louisiana, Montana, Nebraska, Tennessee, Texas, and Utah.
“The Biden Administration proposed numerous regulations to make home appliances more expensive and less useful… Rather than confront that controversy, the previous Administration attempted to dodge it,” Judge Oldham wrote.
The judges held that the Biden DOE improperly used a streamlined “Direct Final Rule” process to impose new standards on consumer conventional cooking products without giving the public meaningful advance notice or a real opportunity to comment.
“The Biden Administration promulgated a rule without giving the public advance notice or the opportunity to comment on it,” the court stated.
The Fifth Circuit completely dismantled every single excuse offered by the Department of Justice lawyers.
-
State Sovereignty Ignored: The court called out the DOE for claiming it had “consensus” by handpicking three far-left states (California, Massachusetts, and New York) while excluding conservative states that opposed the mandate. Judge Oldham noted that holding up three left-wing states as “fair representation” of the entire country was “the understatement of the day”.
-
Flawed Green Tech Mandates: The court highlighted that forcing manufacturers to abandon linear power supplies in favor of complex switching power supplies would shorten the lifespan of kitchen stoves, leading to more repairs, higher costs, and more waste.
-
Illegal Lawmaking: The panel firmly rejected the DOE’s absurd claim that citizens lose their right to challenge a rule if they wait for the official comment period to end.
Judge Oldham slammed the agency’s scheme to weaponize procedural loopholes:
“What the Department could not do was gloss over public outcry, allow the public to file after-the-fact comments, and then ignore those comments in violation of Congress’s plain dictates.”
Previously at The Gateway Pundit:
February 25, 2023 – “Biden Regime’s New ‘Efficiency’ Rule Would Ban Half of Gas Stove Models” (coverage of the earlier 2023 proposal, not the 2024 direct final rule).
January 10, 2024 – “Federal Appeals Court Strikes Down Joe Biden’s Attempt to Regulate Dishwashers and Washing Machines” (related Fifth Circuit appliance litigation involving a different DOE action).
Ad block users: Some site features may not work correctly while an ad blocker is enabled, because they break scripts and content this website depends on. If you can’t see comments below, for example, please disable your ad blocker.
