I don’t have the full article ($), but here’s an excerpt (thanks to Nick Smith, who included the link in today’s Healthy Forests, Healthy Communities email.
An environmental group’s lawsuit filed Wednesday aims to invalidate decades of logging projects, oil and gas leasing, and numerous other federal land management decisions made over the last 30 years because the federal land plans they were conducted under weren’t submitted to Congress.
Cascadia Wildlands’ lawsuit challenges two Oregon federal land management plans finalized by the Bureau of Land Management since the Congressional Review Act was enacted in 1996. The plans, which were never submitted to Congress for review, authorized logging projects the group says harm wildlife.
The group filed the lawsuit after Congress last year, for the first time in history, began using the CRA to scrap BLM land management plans disfavored by congressional Republicans, including plans for Montana, Wyoming, Alaska, and North Dakota.
The Government Accountability Office in 2025 declared the plans are rules under the Administrative Procedure Act. This gives lawmakers the ability to disapprove of them under the CRA, which requires rules to be submitted to Congress before taking effect.
Land plans were never considered rules prior to 2025, and those that took effect between 1996 and 2025 have never been submitted to Congress. Cascadia Wildlands says Congress’ use of the CRA to scrap the plans invalidates countless public lands management decisions made since the CRA became law.
“If land management plans are subject to the CRA, then no land management plan adopted after 1996 is in effect unless and until it has been submitted to Congress,” Cascadia Wildlands and its legal representation, Susan Jane Brown, an attorney for nonprofit law firm Silvix Resources, said in a statement.
A good story that addresses many of the implications of the CRA’s application to land management plans is available (for free!) here: https://morethanjustparks.substack.com/p/breaking-oregon-attorneys-file-historic?triedRedirect=true
SJ- when I read the law, I wondered whether the processes of approval ever happen even for non-plan rules.
I just think of all the federal agencies churning out small and large rules all the time. Reviewing them all sounds like a lot of work, just keeping track let alone getting both Houses to sign off on rules they probably don’t understand, for the most part.
It would be interesting to see how this works or doesn’t in practice.
Here are my ideas.. 1. Congress says “whoops” and blanketly approves a list of all forest plans and RMPs other than the recently contested. Saves lawyer salaries and possible fees.
2. Or they could all (all RMPs and Foret Plans) could just be vacated and we could see what would happen without them- and maybe Congress would look at that and decide to revise NFMA. Or write a statute that says “if the FS cannot produce a plan and have it pass through litigation in 10 years, then that forest is relieved of ever doing another plan revision.” Amendments only from then on.
Somehow when we talked about it before I thought that there was a clause that said “if Congress doesn’t say anything in six months, the rule can go forward.” But I didn’t see it in the statute as posted.
Seems like the logical solution would be for the land management agencies to just submit every management plan from the last 30 years to Congress then. Let it do its thing and either affirm them or reverse them. It would be sweet if they actually did reverse a bunch of these overly restrictive plans that closed thousands of roads and illegally created de facto wilderness, but I’m not holding my breath.
The judge might hold that the plans were effectively submitted to Congress when they were posted on the agency’s site (assuming the judge concludes that plans are rules under the CRA). The CRA was enacted in 1996 when the public-facing internet was still in its infancy, and most government work was still done on paper. This has long since ceased to be the case. It would be odd to say that when a plan is posted on the agency’s site, and therefore becomes available to each of the Earth’s 8 billion people who might have internet access, it has nevertheless somehow *not* been made available to Congress.
Not entirely sure, but I think the effect of such a holding would be to foreclose most further Congressional efforts to use the CRA to reject existing land managment plans since the time for invoking the CRA has, in the vast majority of cases, long since expired.
The CRA outlines a very specific process by which agencies must submit rules (and other required content) to Congress for approval or disapproval: posting to an agency’s website does not meet those criteria. See, 5 U.S.C. § 801 (https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/5/801).
Here is (I think) the relevant CRA language:
(A)Before a rule can take effect, the Federal agency promulgating such rule shall submit to each House of the Congress and to the Comptroller General a report containing—
(i)a copy of the rule;
(ii)a concise general statement relating to the rule, including whether it is a major rule; and
(iii)the proposed effective date of the rule.
To my (perhaps excessively picayune) mind this not “very specific” at all. The argument turns on the phrase “submit to.” Does it mean presenting the plan (er – rule) to Congressional leaders on a velvet pillow with trumpets and drums? Or does it mean something less?
The bigger question, as previously discussed on this blog, is whether there is any time limit on the CRA, or whether a Congress 10,000 years from now could invoke this law to reject some executive branch action from the benighted 21st century. I understand the arguments of the people who say the CRA will apply until the sun devours our sad planet. I simply reject those arguments as inconsistent with the admintration of a rational polity.
That said, I think this complaint is awesome – it is, as the chess folks say, a forking check, and (whether intentionally or not) illustrates the absurdity of this ridiculous statute.
Sharon,
Here’s another article on the same subject published last year (October 08, 2025):
“The Senate Just Voted To Break Public Lands – Every permit written on public lands since 1996 may be rendered invalid”
https://wessiler.substack.com/p/the-senate-just-voted-to-break-public
I’m going to run this by a retired but still engaged attorney I used to work with on matters such as this. I’ll let you know if I get anything useful.
JB
“every permit” ?I wonder if that would include ski area permits? I think there would be some bipartisan political pushback, just guessing..
Yes: every permit.
In that case, I would see a rushed list and set of approvals making its way through Congress, as Patrick suggested. Personally I don’t see the point of opening this can of worms.
1. Biden admin blows off governors with decisions- governors take it to court.
2. Congress uses CRA to get rid of (3?) RMPs (at the time, I thought the new Admin should just redo the decision and pick the “current decision” alternative, although that would have ended up in court no doubt.)
3. Court case to shut down all activities on all forests?
*************
To me, 3 seems out of proportion, which would otherwise be a simple case of Administrational back and forth. There must be more to this than meets the eye.
This kind of move should have been expected, but probably wasn’t, by this Administration. Expecting the Forest Service to ‘follow the rules’ is no longer an option. While it might seem frivolous, on the outside, it does have a good chance of ‘winning’, of one sort or another. Some might call it “lawfare”, while the other side might settle for a strategic retreat, to delay projects’ progress. There’s not a lot to lose by litigating, as I see it. If Congress has to get involved, popcorn stocks will shoot skyward. Bad publicity will happen. Conspiracy theories will be birthed. The Congressional Light will shine brightly on what needs to be protected, and what new agendas seek to do.
I realize the outcome of this case may create a great deal of disruption for me and my program over the next few years, but I still find it rather amusing. It’s especially satisfying to be reminded that many of our elected leaders who have spent the past few years disparaging federal employees are not exactly the sharpest tools in the shed.
Hi Sharon. I don’t have time to comment (leaving tomorrow for a month backpacking in your part of world) but you might check out this link on More than Just Parks Substack post. They gave a lot of background on how conservatives have been using this rule to decommission BLM protections. The Oregon activist attorney is just fighting fire with fire. Interesting the popular press only picked it up when it was advanced as a threat by the environmentalists. https://morethanjustparks.substack.com/p/breaking-oregon-attorneys-file-historic
I thought I already submitted this (maybe on the wrong thread?). Any way, it fits here. Something I found related to submitting rules under the CRA: https://www.acus.gov/recommendation/technical-reform-congressional-review-act
“Still another criticism of the CRA concerns what Congress should do to enable CRA review of agency actions for which agencies do not submit 801(a) reports. The CRA itself does not say what to do in those situations, even though studies show they arise frequently.
Absent statutory text addressing the subject, Congress has adopted a process through which it initiates review of such agency actions by requesting an opinion from the GAO. That process begins when members of Congress or committees request a GAO opinion on whether an agency action qualifies as a “rule” under the CRA. If GAO concludes that it does, a member or a committee provides for publication of the GAO opinion in the Congressional Record. Publication in the Congressional Record is then deemed to be the date that triggers the time periods for CRA review of the agency action.
Although that process has worked tolerably well as a response to the problem of unreported rules, it lacks a clear basis in the CRA’s text. There are also aspects of it that warrant revisiting. For example, there is no time limit for using the current, de facto procedure, meaning Congress might use it to subject a decades-old action to CRA review.[6]”
Also,
“The CRA says nothing about how agencies must deliver 801(a) reports to Congress or the Comptroller General. Congressional rules, however, currently require that 801(a) reports be hand-delivered to both chambers of Congress.”
One other thought. Submitting land management plans for review does not solve the problem for projects authorized consistent with a plan that was not in effect at the time to project was authorized.