On June 28, 2024, in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, the
U.S. Supreme Court overruled the 40-year-old Chevron doctrine,
which was based on the premise that ambiguities in statutes
administered by federal agencies were "implicit
delegations" of interpretive discretion.
Chevron had held that courts should defer to an agency's
adoption of a reasonable interpretation of a statute, even if not
the best interpretation of the law.1
Loper Bright rejected that premise and held instead that courts
generally may not defer to an agency's interpretation, even of
an ambiguous statute, but rather must exercise "independent
judgment" in interpreting the law and must adopt the
"best reading" of statutes, whether or not the agency
agrees with that reading.2
