A Los Angeles federal judge earlier this month ruled that SpaceX can pursue a lawsuit against the California Coastal Commission for allegedly targeting the company for more regulatory scrutiny based on CEO Elon Musk\u2019s political views.<\/p>\n
On July 2, U.S. District Judge Stanley Blumenfeld Jr. issued an order in Los Angeles federal court allowing a portion of SpaceX\u2019s second amended complaint against the commission for denying a request to expand the number of Falcon 9 rocket launches from Vandenberg Space Force Base.<\/p>\n
The commission issued the denial on Oct. 10, 2024, saying SpaceX failed to qualify for state permitting requirements, even though the company launches from a U.S. military facility.<\/p>\n
SpaceX sued five days later, on Oct. 15, 2024, to have the court declare that the commission illegally demanded a coastal development permit to allow additional launches, although the company later amended its complaint for a second time in March to include additional details.<\/p>\n
Blumenfeld granted a motion to dismiss violations of the First Amendment and due process against the commission and individual members based on lack of standing, sovereign immunity and failure to state a claim, but allowed allegations of \u201cbiased attempts to regulate SpaceX\u2019s activity\u201d and unlawfully demanding a CDP to proceed.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn sum, SpaceX has plausibly alleged a ripe, nonspeculative case or controversy over whether it must obtain a CDP to continue its Falcon 9 launches,\u201d Blumenfeld said in his order. \u201cThe credible threat that defendants will bring an enforcement action and subject SpaceX to daily fines for not having a CDP \u2014 which defendants pointedly do not disavow \u2014 is sufficient to establish an actual injury under Article III [of the U.S. Constitution].\u201d<\/p>\n
In its complaint, SpaceX said the commission’s decision to deny an Air Force proposal to increase Falcon 9 launches from 36 to 50 at Vandenberg SFB was politically motivated.\u00a0<\/p>\n
SpaceX cited remarks by the commissioners that indicated their actions \u201cwere substantially motivated by animus and bias against the protected speech of SpaceX and its owner Mr. Musk.\u201d<\/p>\n
In one instance, SpaceX said Commissioner Gretchen Newsom read a prepared statement regarding Musk\u2019s activities during the 2024 presidential election, saying he was \u201chopping about the country, spewing and tweeting political falsehoods.\u201d<\/p>\n
The commission brought a motion to dismiss the second amended complaint in April, arguing that SpaceX hadn\u2019t alleged an \u201cactual or imminent injury,\u201d including harm to its business reputation.<\/p>\n
SpaceX said in its complaint that the commission unlawfully required it to obtain a consistency certification under the federal Coastal Zone Management Act, saying space launches are permitted and aren\u2019t listed as activities that could affect the coastal zone.<\/p>\n
The commission, however, said in its motion to dismiss that this claim is \u201cunfit for judicial review\u201d because SpaceX hadn\u2019t alleged any action that would trigger a requirement for a consistency certification for its Falcon 9 program.<\/p>\n
Blumenfeld agreed with the commission, dismissing this portion of SpaceX\u2019s complaint against all defendants without prejudice.<\/p>\n
Attorneys representing SpaceX declined to comment and the commission did not immediately respond to emailed requests for comment on Friday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Los Angeles federal judge earlier this month ruled that SpaceX can pursue a lawsuit against the California…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":60662,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5123],"tags":[1582,276,43850,28126,66,2544,27550,8142,2961,3228,43848,379,224,5337,43849,39100,2527,43847,27539],"class_list":{"0":"post-60661","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-california","10":"tag-common-law","11":"tag-complaint","12":"tag-elon-musk","13":"tag-falcon-9","14":"tag-federal-government-of-the-united-states","15":"tag-justice","16":"tag-la","17":"tag-law","18":"tag-law-of-the-united-states","19":"tag-lawsuit","20":"tag-los-angeles","21":"tag-losangeles","22":"tag-motion-legal","23":"tag-public-law","24":"tag-spacex","25":"tag-standing-law","26":"tag-united-states-law"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114842586567782230","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60661","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=60661"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60661\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/60662"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=60661"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=60661"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=60661"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}