Opinion ID: 8704903
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: ANSWER Has Alleged Injury Sufficient to Establish Standing for Facial Challenge

Text: ANSWER challenges the regulations on their face and as-applied. See Supp. Pleading ¶ 15. In a facial challenge, the plaintiff seeks to invalidate a statute or regulation, or portions thereof, and obtain a permanent injunction against its enforcement. See, e.g., Gonzales v. Carhart, 550 U.S. 124, 127, 127 S.Ct. 1610, 167 L.Ed.2d 480 (2007) (reviewing facial challenge to abortion law); McConnell v. Federal Election Comm’n, 540 U.S. 93, 134, 124 S.Ct. 619, 157 L.Ed.2d 491 (2003) (reviewing facial challenge to campaign finance law). By definition, the relief sought in a facial challenge sweeps more broadly than the relief required to redress the particular plaintiffs injury. As a result, the plaintiff must show that the law is invalid not only as applied to plaintiff, but also as applied in many or all other circumstances, even though the plaintiff is not subject to every possible application. See United States v. Stevens, 559 U.S. 460, 130 S.Ct. 1577, 1587, 176 L.Ed.2d 435 (2010) (“To succeed in a typical facial attack, [plaintiff] would have to establish ‘that no set of circumstances exists under which [the law] would be valid’ ”) (internal citations omitted); Gonzales v. Carhart, 550 U.S. at 167, 127 S.Ct. 1610 (noting cases requiring plaintiff to show that law would be invalid “in a large fraction of the cases in which [it] is relevant”). A plaintiff presenting a facial challenge still must show an injury to establish Article III standing. See Anderson v. Holder, 647 F.3d 1165, 1172 (D.C.Cir.2011). But there is no question that ANSWER has made that showing here, as defendants agree that ANSWER has demonstrated injury with regard to Freedom Plaza. Def.’s Mot. at 5-6 (“Plaintiff has standing to challenge the Park Service’s 2008 amended regulation ... only to the extent that the regulation grants a regulatory preference to PIC’s Bleacher Area at Freedom Plaza.”). Furthermore, the Court previously held that ANSWER had organizational and representational standing to litigate claims with respect to denials of permit applications for areas along the 2009 Inaugural Parade route. See ANSWER I, 493 F.Supp.2d at 45 (D.D.C.2007). Accordingly, the Court finds that plaintiffs facial challenge survives defendant’s motion to dismiss plaintiffs supplemental pleading in part. If ANSWER were to prevail on its facial challenge to 36 C.F.R. § 7.96(g)(4)(iii)(B)(l), that regulatory provision would be enjoined in its entirety.