WASHINGTON (AP) - Right-leaning legal activists, joined by Elon Musk's artificial intelligence company xAI, are challenging a cornerstone of U.S. legal enforcement: the right of private groups, individuals and local governments to sue over violations of major federal laws.
Their argument, backed by the Trump administration, holds that the Constitution gives the president and federal agencies broad power to decide how - or whether - to enforce federal law. Congress, they contend, never should have handed that authority to others through "citizen suits" embedded in environmental, campaign finance and other statutes.
Environmentalists say losing that tool would be devastating. Citizen suits have extracted millions from polluting oil and gas operations and forced removal of lead pipes in Flint, Michigan. Legal experts say four pending federal cases - one filed last week - are advancing with a conservative Supreme Court majority more receptive than ever. The hard part for challengers now is winning early cases and creating disagreement among federal appeals courts, which could push the issue to the Supreme Court for a nationwide ruling.
The door for that opened with a 2000 Supreme Court opinion.
"Many of us who worked in this area have been waiting basically 26 years for this shoe to drop," said Richard Lazarus, a Harvard professor with decades of experience in environmental law.
A more inviting Supreme Court could take up the issue
Lazarus referenced former Justice Anthony Kennedy's comment in a Clean Water Act case that citizen suits raised "difficult and fundamental" questions about whether they improperly dilute executive power. The late Justice Antonin Scalia wrote in a dissenting opinion that citizen suits turn "over to private citizens the function of enforcing the law." He stopped short of explicitly declaring them unconstitutional.
"The court is more like Scalia's court since he died than it ever was when he was there," Lazarus said. Those who lost cases where Scalia dissented are now rushing back to today's court hoping for a better result, he said.
The critical issue is who collects fines and controls the case. A person filing a citizen suit must notify the government in advance. The government can stop the suit if it pursues the case itself, but its options are limited and the individual filer can stay involved. Citizen suits can force compliance with the law, with fines going to the U.S. Treasury.
Law firms and companies push against citizen suits
Efforts to expand presidential power gained crucial federal support this summer when the Pacific Legal Foundation, a right-leaning organization, signed onto a routine citizen suit in Tennessee federal court to mount a broader constitutional challenge.
The foundation represents Springfield, a town of roughly 19,000 north of Nashville, fighting Tennessee Riverkeeper's allegation that it let too much sewage flow from its treatment plant into a nearby creek, violating the Clean Water Act. It was the thirty-first citizen suit Tennessee Riverkeeper filed under the Clean Water Act since 2010. Pacific Legal argued that was part of the problem - private, unelected activists had repeatedly forced others to spend resources defending themselves.
It's better when "the government is the one wielding the power because the government remains accountable to the people," said Sean Radomski, a Pacific Legal Foundation attorney on the case.
Radomski says he isn't targeting all lawsuits individuals can bring under federal law, only those where fines go to the Treasury and where he says people improperly take on government power. Civil rights lawsuits where damages go directly to those wronged, he said, wouldn't be affected.
Musk's xAI is also fighting a citizen suit
Musk-led xAI made similar arguments in its bid to dismiss the NAACP's lawsuit accusing it of operating dozens of gas turbines near Memphis to power a data center without first obtaining permits. The civil rights group claims turbines are a pollution threat to nearby residents, many of them Black. It's one demand: halt the turbines until the company complies with the law.
The Trump administration intervened to support xAI, arguing that turning off power to artificial intelligence supporting the Department of War would harm national security. Because the administration wants the suit dismissed, the NAACP shouldn't be allowed to proceed, the Department of Justice said.
Laura Thoms, director of enforcement at Earthjustice, representing the NAACP with the case, said the government traditionally joins cases to enforce law, not to argue that breaking it doesn't matter.
"This administration has determined that the company should be allowed to continue to pollute and that therefore, they should have the unilateral and unreviewable authority to veto our citizen suit," she said.
Rewriting the law would have profound consequences
Citizen suits were written into foundational environmental laws because Congress understood federal agencies lack unlimited resources to chase polluters, and sometimes the government itself is the polluter. Outside groups are essential to fulfill the law's purpose, Lazarus said.
That dynamic is critical now, environmentalists say. The current administration has slashed air and water protections, promoted fossil fuels, and constrained enforcement to only extreme cases - such as an "imminent and substantial threat to human health," per a federal guidance memo. Citizen suits fill that gap, they argue. Leaner state budgets make the problem worse.
Thoms said the president could unilaterally waive laws to benefit allies, increasing corruption risks. If citizen suits end, she said, people in strong-protection states may be fine, but others will become "sacrifice zones" where residents have few options to fight pollution.
Many legal experts say those areas are often poor and majority-minority communities. They caution against the challengers' claims of near-absolute presidential control over enforcement, noting U.S. history is filled with examples of private individuals enforcing laws.
David Adelman, a law professor at the University of Texas at Austin School of Law, said saw little chance a challenge would succeed - before the current Supreme Court took shape. "But this court has been so protective of the executive branch's complete control of implementation of federal law," he said, "that it's not implausible that something like this could prevail."
Why this matters for legal professionals
If it succeeds - in or the Supreme Court issues a broad ruling - could reshape environmental compliance and the broader private right of action. Lawyers advising clients on regulatory risk at the state and federal level should track these four cases closely, especially the DOJ's position that national security can outweigh permit requirements. For legal teams working with AI or data center developers, the xAI case stands out: the administration's defense of unfettered AI expansion could carve new exceptions to environmental enforcement. Legal training in this sector may become more valuable as the fight this plays into circulation.
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