Earlier this week, the district court in the Consolidated Delta Smelt Cases issued an order rejecting the request of the federal government and the environmental intervenors immediately to stop the ongoing remand ordered by Judge Wanger in 2011. The court explained that, until the Ninth Circuit (which earlier this month overturned Judge Wanger ...
This morning the Ninth Circuit heard argument in the consolidated Delta smelt appeals. At issue was Judge Oliver Wanger’s decision overturning the 2008 Delta smelt biological opinion, authored by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The appeals raise extremely complex scientific and administrative law issues, and that complexity was made c ...