Green groups challenge Trump rollback of bedrock environmental law.

The White House is facing lawsuits from two coalitions of environmental groups challenging its latest rollback to a bedrock environmental law. The Trump administration finalized changes to the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) just two weeks ago. Environmentalists say the administration's actions gut a law designed to weigh environmental and community effects before roads, pipelines, oil and gas drilling and other major construction projects are permitted. The suits are being led by both the Southern Environmental Law Center (SELC) and Earthjustice, representing more than 35 environmental groups between the suits. “The Trump administration picked the wrong fight,” Kristen Boyles, an Earthjustice attorney serving as co-counsel on the case, said in a release. has called NEPA the “single biggest obstacle” to major construction projects. But environmentalists have a long list of issues with the new rule, starting with how it was developed. The White House Council on Environmental Quality, which promulgated the rule, held two hearings on the changes — one in Washington and one in Denver. It also issued its rule four months after it was proposed, leaving little time to go through the more than 1.1 million public comments submitted...MORE