Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/23pdf/23a349_0813.pdf
Page Number: 42

20 

OHIO v. EPA 

BARRETT, J., dissenting 

the  errors  were  so  serious  and  related  to  matters  of  such 
central relevance to the rule that there is a substantial like-
lihood that the rule would have been significantly changed 
if such errors had not been made.”  §7607(d)(8) (emphasis 
added).  This provision appears “tailor-made to undo” any 
“rigid  presumption  of  vacatur”  that  might  apply  in  other 
contexts.  N. Bagley, Remedial Restraint in Administrative 
Law, 117 Colum. L. Rev. 253, 291 (2017). 
  The alleged error here plausibly is subject to §7607(d)(8)’s 
harmless-error rule.  As explained above, the Court does not 
suggest  that  it  is  substantively  “[un]reasonable”  to  apply 
the FIP to fewer States, only that EPA did not “reasonably 
explai[n]”  the  FIP’s  severability  in  response to  comments.  
Prometheus, 592 U. S., at 423.  That is arguably an “alleged 
procedural  error”  within  the  meaning  of  §7607(d)(8).    In 
fact, the Act contemplates that at least some “arbitrary or 
capricious” challenges allege failures to “observ[e] . . . pro-
cedure required by law,” and such challenges may only suc-
ceed if §7607(d)(8)’s “condition is . . . met.”  §7607(d)(9)(D). 
  If  the  Act’s  harmless-error  rule  applies,  applicants  are 
unlikely to prevail.  Given the apparent lack of connection 
between the number of States covered and the FIP’s meth-
odology for determining cost thresholds and emissions lim-
its, it is difficult to imagine a “substantial” likelihood that 
the rule would have been “significantly” different had EPA 
just responded more thoroughly.  In fact, applicants seem 
to have conceded as much.  See Tr. of Oral Arg. 6 (“[W]ith 
full  candor  to  the  Court,  [the  cost  threshold]  could  be  the 
same or even be more expensive”); id., at 9 (“I can’t tell you 
what  that  looks  like,  whether  there  is  a  difference  in  the 
obligations or not”).  And EPA, the Court says, had “notice” 
of the alleged concern that the cost thresholds might change 
with different States.  Ante, at 15.  Yet EPA still chose to 
make the FIP severable because of its statutory obligation 
to reduce downwind pollution—an obligation it repeatedly