A new Supreme Court ruling on a case involving fishermen has Utah lawmakers excited and they believe it could be critical for the state.
Sen. Mike Lee, Reps. John Curtis, Burgess Owens and Celeste Maloy, as well as Gov. Spencer Cox, Utah House Speaker Mike Schultz, Utah Senate President Stuart Adams and Utah Attorney General Sean Reyes say Friday’s announced decision will have positive implications for the Beehive State.
The case started when a New England fishing company sued over federal monitoring that it said cost them money. Making its way up to the highest court in the country, there was a precedent at the heart of the case: Chevron deference. It’s a legal test to determine when agencies get to choose how to interpret the law rather than the courts.
Now the Supreme Court has overturned that doctrine. This means when the courts review agency actions, they have the power to interpret the law. For the last 40 years, agencies could interpret the law if Congress was ambiguous or silent and agencies had put forward a reasonable or permissible interpretation of law.