Administrative Law

Overview

New regulations, changes to existing laws, and other regulatory or enforcement shifts can have ripple effects that disrupt business-as-usual, inhibit innovation, and even imperil entire industries. Our administrative law practice combines our deep familiarity with administrative procedure with an extensive knowledge of federal (and many state) agencies and their processes to obtain results beneficial to our clients' interests, whether through rulemaking proceedings, informal presentations, agency adjudicative or enforcement proceedings, or in the courts, if necessary.

Our Attorneys

Our administrative law practice brings together lawyers from across the firm's litigation and regulatory practices to help clients wherever they confront governmental action that impacts their businesses. Core to our administrative law practice are attorneys who know how to challenge governmental action under the federal Administrative Procedure Act (APA), the U.S. Constitution, and other applicable law (or, conversely, to intervene to help defend governmental actions), and defend against agency enforcement actions either in court or before agency tribunals. In fact, many of the attorneys have held high-level positions at the DOJ, state AG offices, EPA, HHS, FTC, FDA, DHS, SEC, Treasury, and other agencies, adding valuable perspective about what works when trying to influence agency policies. Outside of the U.S. our Brussels lawyers address the regulatory concerns of our clients conducting business in the EU.

Engagement

Our practitioners know the regulatory programs governing a wide array of industries. We routinely prepare comments on proposed agency rulemakings and advocate on behalf of our clients in meetings with promulgating agencies, as well as with the Office of Management and Budget's Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs — the clearinghouse for all executive agency rulemakings in the United States. But we also know that agencies sometimes issue regulations or take other actions with insufficient regard for what the law requires, both substantively and procedurally. In those situations, our administrative law litigators seek judicial remedies for our clients under the APA, constitutional or treaty provisions, or other applicable sources of law. Our administrative law practice draws on the experiences of attorneys across multiple subject-matter disciplines, and crafts strategies to achieve relief for our clients from unlawful or arbitrary agency rulemaking.

Similarly, when agencies order affirmative conduct, demand the cessation of certain activities, or unfairly penalize (or even just threaten to penalize) routine business practices because of an erroneous or arbitrary application of the law, our attorneys seek to prevent our clients' businesses from being disrupted: going to court (federal or state), seeking agency meetings, or working with congressional committees to obtain remedial oversight or legislative relief. Regardless of the forum, the key to our success is the collaborative, creative spirit that brings the broad experiences of our practitioners to bear on behalf of our clients.

When engagement with regulators reaches an impasse, an agency takes arbitrary or capricious action, or a private enforcement action or “citizen suit” threatens our clients' interests, our attorneys work creatively to achieve favorable results for our clients in courts, before administrative tribunals, and even in the halls of Congress.

Results

But don't just take our word for it: the results speak for themselves.

Insights

Firm News | 3 min read | 11.03.23

Crowell & Moring Earns 59 Rankings in 2024 “Best Law Firms” Report

Crowell & Moring ranked nationally in 20 practice areas in the 2024 edition of Best Lawyers “Best Law Firms.” In addition, the firm was ranked in 39 metropolitan categories.

Representative Matters

  • Representing American Farm Bureau Federation as intervenor in an APA lawsuit challenging the legality of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Bioengineered Food Disclosure Standard.
  • Advising a national agricultural trade association on regulatory proposals and APA litigation involving the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s conservation compliance programs.
  • Advised a company on potential grounds to bring an APA challenge to the Consumer Product Safety Commission’s efforts to recall infant inclined sleeper products.
  • Represented trade associations in numerous APA challenges to EPA rulemakings arising under the Clean Water Act, Clean Air Act, and the Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act.
  • Led APA challenge to EPA rulemaking on chemical issues on grounds the agency failed to provide due process.
  • Counsel the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association on EPA's new—and existing—source power plant greenhouse gas emission standards.
  • Represent American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers Association in D.C. Circuit litigation regarding EPA’s renewable fuel standards and ozone national ambient air quality standards.
  • Won summary judgment for an energy company in an APA lawsuit challenging a final decision of the Department of the Interior as unlawful, arbitrary and capricious, and a violation of due process where the agency’s action affected the property rights of Crowell’s client yet the agency never gave Crowell’s client notice and a chance to comment on the intended action.
  • Represented trade association in an APA lawsuit challenging the legality and reasonableness of the Small Business Association’s and Office of Management and Budget’s handling of information gathering related to applications for loan forgiveness under the 2020 CARES Act’s Paycheck Protection Program.
  • Obtained summary judgment on behalf of a government defense contractor in a FOIA case in the Northern District of California, in which the court agreed with Crowell’s argument that confidential information of its client in possession of the Department of Defense was exempt from disclosure under FOIA Exemption 4.

Insights

Firm News | 3 min read | 11.03.23

Crowell & Moring Earns 59 Rankings in 2024 “Best Law Firms” Report

Crowell & Moring ranked nationally in 20 practice areas in the 2024 edition of Best Lawyers “Best Law Firms.” In addition, the firm was ranked in 39 metropolitan categories.

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Professionals

Insights

Firm News | 3 min read | 11.03.23

Crowell & Moring Earns 59 Rankings in 2024 “Best Law Firms” Report

Crowell & Moring ranked nationally in 20 practice areas in the 2024 edition of Best Lawyers “Best Law Firms.” In addition, the firm was ranked in 39 metropolitan categories.