Currently a Senior Attorney at Pacific Legal Foundation, Damien joined PLF in 2005. His practice has focused on federal and state environmental and land-use issues. Damien was counsel of record in Sackett v. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, a groundbreaking decision in which the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the right of landowners to challenge Clean Water Act compliance orders issued by the Environmental Protection Agency.
In addition to the Clean Water Act, Damien’s practice includes direct litigation and friend-of-the-court briefs in cases arising under the federal and California Endangered Species Acts, as well as other environmental laws. He has appeared on a variety of television and radio programs, and has been quoted in The Economist, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal, among other publications.
Damien obtained his law degree magna cum laude from the University of San Diego School of Law, and his undergraduate degree magna cum laude from Georgetown University. While at USD, Damien was a research assistant for Professor Bernard Siegan, a leading constitutional theorist and advocate for property rights and economic liberty. Immediately prior to joining PLF, Damien clerked for Judge (and former PLF attorney) Victor Wolski of the United States Court of Federal Claims. Damien credits the mentoring and examples of Professor Siegan and Judge Wolski for his decision to pursue a career in liberty-based public interest litigation.
Damien lives in Sacramento with his wife, two young sons, and a cat named Lily. He is a card-carrying member of the American Philatelic Society.
Lent v. California Coastal CommissionIn 2016, the Lents received the California Coastal Commission’s first ever fine—$4.185 million—for blocking public access to the beach. The home sits 20 feet above the beach and, without stairs or a ramp, the public cannot safely get to the beach. The property originally included an outdoor stairway and a gate to block the large drop—bo ...
Northern New Mexico Stockman’s Association v. U.S. Fish and Wildlife ServiceIn 2016, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service designated as critical habitat some 14,000 acres of land and 170 miles of streams in Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico for the jumping mouse. The designation severely limits ranchers’ access to grazing land and watering spots and, according to the Fish and Wildlife Service, adds $20 million in regul ...
Vaping LitigationElectronic nicotine delivery systems—vaping devices and e-cigarettes—first hit U.S. stores in 2007. It didn’t take long for vaping to jump from zero to a $5 billion domestic industry, as entrepreneurs quickly recognized a market hungry for an alternative to traditional cigarettes. In 2016, just as the burgeoning vaping industry was gettin ...
Coastal Rights Coalition v. California Coastal CommissionWhen coastal property owners seek permits for new residential development, the California Coastal Commission requires them to agree never to build a seawall to protect the structure from storms and erosion. This policy was imposed by fiat, without public notice, hearings, and opportunity for public comment, as required by the California Administra ...
Town of Coos Bay, Oregon v. National Marine Fisheries ServiceFederal bureaucrats are twisting environmental and emergency management law to control zoning across Oregon, including its treasured coastal regions. At issue is a National Marine Fisheries Service opinion that governs FEMA’s national flood insurance program. Under the rule, local communities wanting federal flood insurance must abstain from ...
Weyerhaeuser/Markle v. U.S. Fish and Wildlife ServiceAs a child, Edward Poitevent’s family cut down Christmas trees on their lumber-rich land in Louisiana, and one day he’d like to leave the property to his own children. But federal bureaucrats jeopardized his legacy when they declared nearly 1,500 acres of his family’s private land as a critical habitat for the dusky gopher frog— ...
Today, the Supreme Court agreed to hear County of Maui v. Hawaii Wildlife Fund, in which PLF filed a friend-of-the-court brief. This case is about whether the Clean Water Act regulates pollution that reaches surface water by means of groundwater. If it does, as the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals said, then every homeowner with ...
When it comes to government bureaucrats abusing citizens' property rights and pushing the envelope on constitutional limits, the California Coastal Commission is in a class by itself. Our latest effort to defend a pair of Southern California homeowners against the commission's overly aggressive and heavy-handed tactics is a case study in government ...
Yesterday we received an adverse decision from the San Diego Superior Court in California Cattlemen’s Association v. California Fish & Game Commission, our challenge to the Commission’s decision to list the gray wolf under the California Endangered Species Act. Our lawsuit raised three arguments against the listing, which the Depar ...
A single sighting of a wolf that had crossed over into California from Oregon—that's all it took for Golden State bureaucrats to declare the gray wolf as a protected species under the state's Endangered Species Act (ESA). That ill-fated decision has significant implications for farmers, ranchers and other property owners in California. Yesterday, ...
Originally published by Investor Business Daily October 12, 2018. Regulatory reform is a hot topic nowadays, and no wonder. The size and expense of the federal administrative state are staggering. One study estimates that, in 2015 alone, new federal regulation cost the American economy more than $22 billion. Thankfully, judicial and statutory refor ...
Late last year, PLF submitted a petition for rule-making to the Interior and Commerce Departments (and their delegate agencies the United States Fish and Wildlife Service and National Marine Fisheries Service), requesting the promulgation of definitions for the terms “species” and “subspecies” as used in the Endangered Speci ...
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