In May, the U.S. Supreme Court narrowed the realms of protection for the Clean Water Act during the hearing for Sackett v. EPA. Because of this, the majority of the country’s wetlands are no longer federally protected by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), according to NPR. This change has left millions of acres across the United States unprotected.
In 2006, the Supreme Court set a precedent that wetlands were to be protected if they are connected to major waterways. New EPA standards “[removed] the significant nexus test from consideration,” the EPA said in an interview, claiming that they had no other option but to roll back protections after the Supreme Court limited them.
According to the Guardian, this is the second ruling the current Supreme Court has made that has scaled back on environmental protections. Environmental experts have warned that stripping wetlands of protection will lead to “pollution without penalty,” and that it will jeopardize the clean drinking water of many Americans.
