Court case

For most people, the Supreme Court’s decision in West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency was about environmental policy and what the Environmental Protection Agency can still do to cut carbon emissions. For a smaller subset, mostly lawyers, W. VA v. EPA was an important (but confusing) administrative law case what we will spend a bunch of time arguing about how to apply to agencies generally.

The Supreme Court’s latest climate change ruling could dampen efforts by federal agencies to rein in the tech industry, which went largely unregulated for decades as the government tried to catch up to changes wrought by the internet. In the 6-3 decision that was narrowly tailored to the Environmental Protection Agency, the court ruled that the EPA does not have broad authority to reduce power plant emissions that contribute to global warming. The precedent is widely expected to invite challenges of other rules set by government agencies.

The Biden Administration's loss in a Supreme Court ruling involving the Environmental Protection Agency's ability to regulate power plants could be a victory for internet service providers (ISPs)' arguments that the Federal Communications Commission was outside its regulatory lane when it reclassified internet access as a Title II common carrier service subject to open access and other requirements and imposed new neutrality rules.

A state court judge in Ohio is allowing Attorney General David Yost to proceed with an effort to prohibit Google from prioritizing its services or products in search results. In a ruling issued May 24, Delaware County Common Pleas Court Judge James Schuck declined to dismiss Yost's claim that Google's search engine is a “common carrier.” “The court believes, at this stage of the proceeding, that the state should have the ability to take discovery, develop its case, and present evidence to support its claim,” Schuck wrote.

A federal appeals court has reinstated a Texas state law that bans "censorship" on social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter, allowing Texas to enforce the law while litigation continues. A US District Court judge had granted a preliminary injunction blocking the law in December 2021, ruling that it violates the social networks' First Amendment right to moderate user-submitted content.

Lobbying groups representing broadband internet access service providers—including ACA Connects, NCTA, CTIA and USTelecom—dropped their challenge of a federal district court's ruling upholding California's net neutrality law. The ISPs had already lost a federal district court challenge to the law and two appeals court efforts to block enforcement. The suit was dismissed without prejudice, which means ISPs could refile it if they chose.

One thing that is extremely rare in the broadband industry is lawsuits between internet service providers (ISPs) concerning unfair trade practices. Big ISPs bully and compete unfairly against small ISPs all of the time, and yet you don’t hear of many cases where a small ISP sues the big ISP. There are several reasons for this. One is simple to understand – the big ISPs have a flock of in-house lawyers who can overwhelm anybody who sues them. Little ISPs don’t generally have the deep pockets needed to last through a long, protracted lawsuit.

The 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals will not reconsider its decision in January to uphold California's net neutrality law. California's 2018 law barred internet service providers from blocking or throttling traffic, or offering paid fast lanes, but it only took effect in 2021.