Ocean Winds has attacked the “bad faith” litigation of the Trump administration in an ongoing court challenge to the developer’s federal construction permit for the up to 2400MW SouthCoast Wind.
Lawyers representing the federal government have asked the court to indefinitely stay a lawsuit against the project from the Massachusetts island-municipality of Nantucket, so they can reconsider the project’s Construction and Operations Plan (COP).
“Federal Defendants have no genuine legal basis to reconsider the COP; they seek only to use remand to withdraw the COP approval and eliminate the Project,” lawyers representing Ocean Winds told the court.
“This overt litigation tactic is made in bad faith without any legal authority or regard for the impact on SouthCoast Wind or the public at large.”
SouthCoast Wind’s COP was approved by the Biden administration just days before Donald Trump’s inauguration.
The developer argued that the federal government’s motion to remand the permit cites the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act, rather than the two laws cited by Nantucket in the underlying lawsuit, the National Environmental Policy Act and the National Historic Preservation Act.
“Neither the substance of the COP nor OCSLA are at issue in this case, nor mentioned even once in the Complaint,” Ocean Winds argued.
The court should throw out the Trump Administration’s request, and act to “protect the public from undue burdens imposed by another branch of government”, the developer wrote.
“If this Court remands this case back to the Federal Defendants for indefinite review, the effect, as has been made obvious by the statements and actions from the executive branch, will be illegal termination of this Project for political reasons.”