News & Updates

The Western Environmental Law Center is appalled at the murder in Atlanta of one man and seven women, six of them Asian-American. This case appears clearly motivated by anti-Asian racism and misogyny. The case also appears clearly fueled by anti-Asian slurs from...

The Western Environmental Law Center offers heartfelt congratulations to board member Daniel Cordalis, who has been chosen to be Deputy Solicitor of Water at the U.S. Department of the Interior. He will step down from the WELC board of directors. We are sorry to lose...

Today, Friends of the Clearwater (FOC) filed a lawsuit to protect sensitive wildlife habitat in the proposed Great Burn Wilderness, which the Forest Service recommended for Congress to designate as wilderness in 1987. The suit seeks to protect Fish Lake from motorized...

A federal court late yesterday ruled against a massive Montana coal mine expansion, finding the federal government inappropriately ignored the climate, environmental, and health consequences of more mining. In a rebuke of the U.S. Office of Surface Mining, Judge Susan...

Today, President Biden issued an expansive set of executive orders to address the climate crisis, safeguard 30% of our country’s lands and waters by 2030, restore the scientific integrity of federal decision-making, invest in sustainable infrastructure, and deliver...

As President Biden prepares to announce a moratorium on new oil and gas leasing and permitting on public lands and oceans, 32 climate, conservation, religious and business groups in Colorado today announced support for the move in a letter to the president. Biden...

Moving to protect the climate, public health, and to further environmental justice, a coalition on Tuesday filed a complaint in federal court challenging two oil and gas lease sales in New Mexico’s Greater Chaco region. Today’s filing is a supplement to an earlier...

As Joe Biden prepared to assume the presidency this week, a coalition filed a lawsuit to overturn the Trump administration’s sale of more than 1 million acres of public lands in the American West for fracking. Filed in federal court by WildEarth Guardians, Physicians...

Today, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) upheld the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality’s denial of a key permit for the proposed Jordan Cove LNG export terminal and Pacific Connector fracked gas pipeline. The Jordan Cove LNG project cannot move...

Today, conservationists challenged a U.S. Forest Service decision that would allow livestock grazing across 271,665 acres of the Greater Gila bioregion in the Apache-Sitgreaves and Gila National Forests in Arizona and New Mexico over a 10-year period. This massive...