Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/22pdf/22-58_i425.pdf
Page Number: 59

Cite as:  599 U. S. ____ (2023) 

17 

ALITO, J., dissenting 

as  the  Court  acknowledges  when  it  invokes  Heckler  di-
rectly,  that  decision  is  not  about  standing;  it  is  about  the 
interpretation of the statutory exception to APA review for 
actions “committed to agency discretion by law.”  5 U. S. C. 
§701(a)(2); see 470 U. S., at 823; ante, at 11.  And even in 
that context, Heckler expressly contemplates that any “pre-
sumption” of discretion to withhold enforcement can be re-
butted  by  an  express  statutory  limitation  of  discretion—
which is exactly what we have here.  470 U. S., at 832–833. 
So rather than answering questions about this case, the 
majority’s footnote on Massachusetts raises more questions
about  Massachusetts  itself—most  importantly,  has  this
monumental decision been quietly interred?  Cf. ante, at 3 
(GORSUCH, J., concurring in judgment). 

Massachusetts v. EPA is not the only relevant precedent 
that the Court brushes aside.  “[I]t is well established that 
[this  Court]  has  an  independent  obligation  to  assure  that
standing  exists,  regardless  of  whether  it  is  challenged  by
any of the parties.”  Summers v. Earth Island Institute, 555 
U. S. 488, 499 (2009).  Yet in case after case, with that obli-
gation  in  mind,  we  have  not  questioned  the  standing  of 
States that brought suit under the APA to compel civil en-
forcement. 

In Little Sisters of the Poor Saints Peter and Paul Home 
v. Pennsylvania, 591 U. S. ___ (2020), two States sued un-
der  the  APA  and  sought  to  compel  the  Department  of
Health and Human Services to cease exercising regulatory
enforcement discretion that exempted certain religious em-
ployers  from  compliance  with  a  contraceptive-coverage
mandate.  Id., at ___–___ (slip op., at 11–12).  The issue of 
the States’ standing was discussed at length in the decision
below,  see  Pennsylvania  v.  President  United  States,  930 
F. 3d 543, 561–565 (CA3 2019), and in this Court, no Jus-
tice  suggested  that  the  Constitution  foreclosed  standing 
simply because the States were complaining of “the Execu-