Following setbacks in state court, the Justice Department is transferring a legal fight over the restart of a California oil pipeline to a federal bench.
The Trump administration notified a federal district court in California late last week that it was shifting venues after a judge on the California Superior Court declined to dissolve her injunction blocking the restart of Sable Offshore’s Santa Ynez pipeline system.
Sable Offshore, which joined the federal government in its removal notice, is in the process of reviving oil production near the Santa Barbara Channel after a 2015 oil spill that shuttered the Santa Ynez Unit for a decade.
Energy Secretary Chris Wright had sought to bypass legal battles over the company’s pipeline by issuing an order requiring its restart under the Defense Production Act. Sable Offshore began operating its pipeline shortly after the secretary’s March order.
