Columbus, OH – On Tuesday, The Buckeye Institute joined Washington Legal Foundation and the National Federation of Independent Business Small Business Legal Center in filing a second amicus brief in Ohio Telecom Association v. Federal Communications Commission (FCC), after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit agreed to rehear the case en banc (by the full court), calling on the court to affirm congressional authority over federal rulemaking. 

“Using the Congressional Review Act process, Congress already scrapped the FCC rule at question in this case,” said David C. Tryon, director of litigation at The Buckeye Institute. “Congress’s action wasn’t mere virtue signaling—it was binding law. If the FCC  wants to impose this rule, it must do so through Congress.”

In its brief, the amici argue that when Congress passed the Congressional Review Act in 1996, it intended to rein in the overreach of the administrative state and assert congressional authority over federal rulemaking. This is precisely what Congress did when, in 2017, it exercised its constitutional authority and used the Congressional Review Act to scrap an FCC rule. In 2024, despite the absence of subsequent congressional authority, the FCC proposed a nearly identical rule again. As the amici argue, the Congressional Review Act strips the agency of the authority to ever try to reissue the rule unless Congress greenlights it first.

Alliance Defending Freedom represents Daniel Grand in Grand v. University Heights, Ohio.

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