Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/22pdf/21-454_4g15.pdf
Page Number: 75

8 

SACKETT v. EPA 

KAVANAUGH, J., concurring in judgment 

  In 2023, under President Biden, the Army Corps and 
EPA  once  again  issued  a  new  rule  that  defined 
“adjacent”  wetlands  to  include  wetlands  “separated 
from  other  waters  of  the  United  States  by  man-made
dikes  or  barriers,  natural  river  berms,  beach  dunes, 
and the like.”  88 Fed. Reg. 3143–3144. 

That longstanding and consistent agency interpretation
reflects and reinforces the ordinary meaning of the statute.
The  eight  administrations  since  1977  have  maintained 
dramatically  different  views  of  how  to  regulate  the
environment, including under the Clean Water Act.  Some 
of 
those  administrations  promulgated  very  broad 
interpretations  of  adjacent  wetlands.    Others  adopted  far 
narrower  interpretations.    Yet  all  of  those  eight  different 
administrations have recognized as a matter of law that the
Clean  Water  Act’s  coverage  of  adjacent  wetlands  means 
more than adjoining wetlands and also includes wetlands 
separated  from  covered  waters  by  man-made  dikes  or 
barriers,  natural  river  berms,  beach  dunes,  or  the  like. 
That consistency in interpretation is strong confirmation of 
the ordinary meaning of adjacent wetlands. 

III 
The  Act  covers  “adjacent”  wetlands.    And  adjacent 
wetlands  is  a  broader  category  than  adjoining  wetlands.
But  instead  of  adhering  to  the  ordinary  meaning  of
“adjacent”  wetlands,  to  the  45  years  of  consistent  agency 
practice,  and  to  this  Court’s  precedents,  the  Court  today
adopts a test under which a wetland is covered only if the
wetland has a “continuous surface connection” to a covered 
water—in other words, if it adjoins a covered water.  Ante, 
at 22 (internal quotation marks omitted).  The Court says
that  the  wetland  and  the  covered  water  must  be 
“indistinguishable”  from  one  another—in  other  words, 
there must be no “clear demarcation” between wetlands and 
covered  waters.  Ante,  at  21  (internal  quotation  marks