Supreme Court to decide cases on nuclear fuel storage, gun lawsuit

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court announced on Friday it will decide disputes about the scope of Nuclear Regulatory Commission power, e-cigarette marketing approvals and a $10 billion fight between the Mexican government and gunmakers and more.

The justices announced more than a dozen additional cases to their work this term, which starts Monday and concludes at the end of June.

Several of the cases the court agreed to hear Friday involve Biden administration fights over the power exercised by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit, where a majority of the judges were appointed by Republican presidents.

In the Nuclear Regulatory Commission cases, the Biden administration and a nuclear fuel storage company asked the Supreme Court to overturn two decisions by the 5th Circuit in challenges to licensing of a storage facility in Texas.

The Biden administration called the 5th Circuit an “outlier” for setting a low standard for when outside groups can challenge an administrative decision and criticized the decision holding that the NRC could not issue licenses for temporary storage facilities.

The Biden administration argued that the court “misinterpreted” two laws, the Atomic Energy Act and the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, which are meant to work together to give the NRC the authority to license the storage of spent nuclear fuel outside of a reactor. In its petition to the Supreme Court, the Biden administration said the 5th Circuit decision “upended more than 40 years of agency practice.”

In FDA v. R.J. Reynolds Vapor Co., the Biden administration asked the justices to overturn a decision by the 5th Circuit that kept their fight over e-cigarette approvals in that court even though R.J. Reynolds is not headquartered in any of the states covered by the appeals court.

The case is somewhat related to one the justices have already agreed to decide this term, over the process FDA followed for denying marketing approvals for e-cigarettes.

In Smith & Wesson Brands et al. v. Estados Unidos Mexicanos, gunmakers asked the justices to overturn a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit that allowed a suit alleging $10 billion in damages in Mexico caused by violence spurred by American gunmakers’ products.

The gunmakers argued in a Supreme Court filing that their sale of firearms is protected under federal law and the Mexican government cannot sue gunmakers because of “criminals misusing their products.”

Several Republican members of Congress backed the gunmakers in their own brief to the Supreme Court in the case, arguing the Mexican government’s suit “disrespects” American government and that Congress passed a law specifically preventing gunmakers in order “to prevent precisely this sort of lawsuit.”

The justices also agreed to hear disputes over age discrimination, conflicts of interest in benefit plans, a death penalty case and more.