Sean Reilly, E&E NewsOriginally published by E&E NewsThe U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will not fight a judge's February decision to throw out its ban on advisory committee service by agency grant recipients, meaning the heavily litigated 2017 policy is legally dead for now.In a carefully couched statement released late yesterday, agency lawyers said they would not appeal the opinion by U.S.
District Judge Denise Cote, which found that EPA had failed to provide a "reasoned explanation" for the ban (Greenwire, 11 February).While not ruling out a future attempt to revive the prohibition, EPA would do so only through a supplemental ethics regulation with a signoff from the Office of Government Ethics, the statement said.