The Trump administration is urging the nation’s highest bench to decline to hear a fight over whether federal nuclear safety standards prevent courts from holding companies liable under state tort law for alleged injuries from nuclear material.
In a recent brief to the Supreme Court, Solicitor General D. John Sauer cautioned the justices against hearing the case from Cotter Corp., which is facing legal action from two sisters who claim the company’s pollution of a creek near their Missouri home led to their cancer diagnoses.
In Cotter v. Mazzocchio, the company is challenging a ruling from the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that found that it could apply state “standards of care,” controlling the handling and disposal of nuclear materials.
Sauer said the company’s petition had arrived at the Supreme Court too soon.
