Federal Judiciary

Deepwater drilling allowed

By Akin Gump Supreme Court Practice Group

A federal judge in New Orleans on Thursday rejected the Obama Administration’s plea to delay his ruling that the government wrongly imposed a six-month moratorium on deepwater oil well drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.  District Judge Martin L.C. Feldman, in a two-page order (found here), said his ruling on Tuesday against the moratorium supplied the reasons for refusing to delay it while the Administration appealed to the Fifth Circuit Court.   The judge refused the challengers’ plea to issue a new order commanding obedience to his ruling, saying that was premature.  And he ordered public release of his financial disclosure statement for last year — something sought by environmental groups who favor the moratorium; in earlier such statements, the judge had indicated he had investments in the oil industry.

Full post as published by SCOTUSBLOG on June 24, 2010 (boomark / email).