The Law That Can Stop Trump’s Environmental Agenda is One You’ve Probably Never Heard Of

Earthjustice has already filed more than 20 lawsuits against the second Trump administration, and that number is about to go much higher as agencies scramble to keep up with the president’s executive orders, proclamations, and social media posts.  In many of these cases, we’ll be relying on a law that you may not even know exists.

Many people have heard of the Clean Water Act, Clean Air Act, and Endangered Species Act.  But fewer are aware of another, older law that is a cornerstone of our modern government.  It’s a law that has benefited all Americans.  You may even have taken advantage of it directly, even if you didn’t know it.

Meet the Administrative Procedure Act

Congress passed the Administrative Procedure Act in 1946, a time when agencies were beginning to assume a bigger role in effectuating and enforcing federal laws. Congress wanted to set some guardrails to make sure they were working for the public — and within the law.

The APA sets out the rules of the road for how agencies should carry out their duties under the laws they administer.  It’s the operating system that guides the executive branch, and its provisions are so commonsense that all states now have their own version of the law.

The APA gives you a voice

One of the most important things the APA did was to define a rulemaking process that agencies must follow when they create or enforce rules (also known as regulations).  Under the APA, agencies must do the following before they make or change most rules:

• Publish the proposed rule in the Federal Register, the daily newspaper that tracks federal regulatory activity;
• Provide a reasonable time (usually 30 or 60 days) for the public to comment on the proposal and explain how to do so;
• Hold, in some cases, actual meetings to make sure all perspectives are heard; and
• Review the comments and explain how it incorporated or rejected any substantive input in the final rule.

Just about anything goes when it comes to comments: People can express support or opposition to the proposal, explain its potential impacts, challenge its assumptions, or propose alternatives. Interested researchers and policy experts often weigh in. And, of course, private entities often explain what the rule would mean for their bottom lines.

Agency rule makers need to be good rule followers too. If they fail to follow the APA’s process, their new rule will likely get tossed out by a judge. For example, in April 2025 President Trump instructed his agencies to roll back regulations protecting some of the oldest and most pristine coral reefs on the planet.  Instead of proposing a new rule and seeking comments, the agency simply wrote a letter announcing that the old rule was rescinded. Thanks to the APA, we were able to get a court to quickly vacate the letter.

The APA keeps agencies accountable to the courts — and to Congress

In addition to telling agencies how to go about making rules, the APA also bars them from taking actions that are “arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of discretion.”

This standard isn’t just about addressing comments. If an agency disregards important information, relies on faulty data or assumptions, or applies outdated or flawed science, it had better be ready to explain that in court.

For example, the APA gave us the tools we needed when the EPA relied on outdated studies and ignored its own research to allow the use of more crop-based biofuels like ethanol.  We challenged the rule in court and won.

The APA also brings other laws to life by prohibiting agency actions that are “otherwise not in accordance with law.”  So even if an agency checks all the notice-and-comment rulemaking boxes and bases its action on solid science, it still can’t publish a rule that contradicts a law passed by Congress.  To pick current example we are fighting, if Congress passes a law requiring the EPA to issue environmental justice grants, the EPA can’t decide on its own to terminate those grants.

The APA also requires agencies to act within a reasonable time frame. For example, back in 2021 Earthjustice submitted a petition to EPA on behalf of farmworkers and public health groups asking it to ban organophosphate pesticides.  In June 2025, after four years of agency inaction, we sued to compel the agency to act on our petition.

The APA and the Trump administration

Donald Trump has been issuing a barrage of executive orders telling agencies from the FDA to the EPA to roll back regulations and end important programs.  At the same time, his appointees are doing everything they can to push through policies that range from the ill-advised to illegal. In this rush they are ignoring, skirting, or outright flouting the APA.

This isn’t the first time a Trump administration has tried to ride roughshod over our procedural laws.  The APA played a role in many of Earthjustice’s victories against the first Trump administration, helping us win 84 percent of our cases.  Thanks to the APA, we were able to save rare whales, cancel improperly issued offshore drilling permits, and stop a harebrained scheme to pump water out of the Mojave Desert.

In the current administration, we’ve already used the APA to get the U.S. Department of Agriculture to restore climate-related pages and websites that it had tried to purge, including sites that gave farmers information on how to access funding for critical conservation practices.

We’re also using the APA to fight the administration’s efforts to claw back funding that was approved under the Inflation Reduction Act and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.  Those cuts threaten many important initiatives, including investments to build a national network of electric vehicle charging stations and to strengthen communities facing the greatest impacts from pollution and environmental degradation.

Some may find it unsatisfying to rely on a procedural law to challenge this administration’s actions.  People also grumbled when federal prosecutors resorted to tax laws to take down mob boss Al Capone in the 1930s. But a smart litigator uses every tool at their disposal to secure justice. And every one of the 200 lawyers here knows how to use the APA.