Rep. Stansbury Releases Statement after Supreme Court Hands Down Three Critical Decisions, Including Chevron Deference Decision

WASHINGTON—U.S. Representative Melanie Stansbury (NM-01) released the following statement after the United States Supreme Court handed down decisions on three critical cases involving Administrative Law, prosecutions of January 6 Insurrection cases, and protections for vulnerable and unhoused individuals.

"Once again, the extremism of Trump’s Supreme Court supermajority is on full display in today’s decisions handed down by the Court," said Rep. Stansbury. "Taken together, these three decisions gut decades of legal precedent protecting our environment and public health, will undermine the prosecution of hundreds of Jan. 6 cases of individuals involved in the insurrection, and will leave our nation’s most vulnerable and unhoused without protection.

As a science professional who has spent my career working to address our nation’s water and climate challenges, it is shocking to watch as the Supreme Court has sought to legislate from the bench without regard for science, the established rule of law, and concern for the basic well-being our communities and environment.

This Supreme Court has sought to expand its power far beyond what the Founding Fathers ever could have imagined, undermining our nation’s most basic checks and balances in the name of advancing an extremist conservative agenda. 40-years of legal precedent has been overturned with today’s decisions in the Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo case and countless public health, safety, and environmental protections are now threatened.

Cases like this are exactly why we need to reform the Court and hold our Justices accountable—and why I introduced the Judicial Ethics Enforcement Act and am a co-sponsor of the Supreme Court Ethics Recusal and Transparency Act and High Court Gift Ban.

The full scope of these disastrous decisions will be seen in the upcoming months, but the Supreme Court is tightening its grip on the everyday lives of the American people with devastating consequences for the air we breathe, the water we drink, the food we eat, the medicines we need, and so much more. We must reform the Court.

Today, the Supreme Court handed down the following decisions. In a 6-3 ruling in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, the Court overturned 40-years of precedent and upended federal agencies’ authority to interpret laws passed by Congress to issue regulations on countless, major issues for the American people, including climate and health care. In a 6-3 ruling in City of Grants Pass v. Johnson, the court upheld the Grants Pass law that banned homeless residents from sleeping outdoors, saying they didn’t violate the Constitution’s law of cruel and unusual punishment, which was strongly dissented by Justice Sotomayor. In a 6-3 ruling in Fischer v. United States, the Court ruled that the obstruction law used to charge the January 6 insurrectionists was improperly applied.

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