Today: Ninth Circuit Oral Arguments In Hawaii Anti-GMO Cases

by Robert Thomas, InverseCondemnation, June 15, 2016

All you preemption, agriculture, municipal and local government law junkies, take note: later today, a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals will hear arguments in three cases, each of which is an appeal of the District Court's seriatim invalidation of county ordinances which regulated GMO and pesticide use in Kauai, Maui, and Hawaii Counties, respectively. The Ninth Circuit live streams its arguments, so those of you not able to be present in the downtown Honolulu courthouse today can follow along.

In each of the three cases, the District Court invalidated the ordinances, mainly on the ground that county ordinances regulating GMO production and pesticide use are preempted by state law.

We won't go into the details of the cases, having covered them many times previously. Disclosure: we also filed an amicus brief in one of the cases in the District Court, and represented the "vote no" campaign in a preelection challenge to the Maui County ordinance, which was adopted by initiative.

Once the Ninth Circuit posts the video recording on its site, we'll repost it here as well for those who cannot watch in real time.