North Dakota
Supreme Court ruling bolsters North Dakota cases, AG Wrigley says
Attorney General Drew
Wrigley (R-ND)
By Amy Dalrymple
BISMARCK, N.D. (North Dakota Monitor) – North Dakota Attorney General Drew Wrigley said a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision curbing the regulatory power of the executive branch could give the state a boost in its roughly 30 pending lawsuits against the federal government.
The high court’s ruling, released June 28, reverses a 40-year policy that required federal courts to defer to executive branch agencies when interpreting vague laws.
“It’s a long time coming,” Wrigley said of the decision in Loper Bright Enterprises vs. Raimondo. “This was an unwise doctrine when it was first pronounced decades back.”
The practice — often called “Chevron deference” after the Supreme Court 1984 ruling that created it — applied to how federal agencies enacted regulatory marching orders from Congress.
When Congress passes a law directing an agency to regulate something, its instructions are seldom 100% clear. The court decided in the 1984 case that federal agencies could use their own expertise to fill in the blanks in areas where the law is ambiguous.
The idea was that the agencies would know best how to interpret the will of Congress, and that the doctrine would protect them from excessive legal challenges.
The Supreme Court’s recent decision revoked this power. Now, it’s up to federal judges to interpret gray areas in legislation.
The ruling is expected to lead to significant regulatory changes as the federal government implements the new standard.
Wrigley said he expects the ruling to be largely positive for North Dakota’s spate of lawsuits against the federal government — which includes cases challenging regulations passed by the Environmental Protection Agency, Department of the Interior, Bureau of Land Management, Department of Education and more.
“This decision has taken away power from nameless, faceless bureaucrats,” he said.
The ruling could also have major impacts on the federal government’s relationships with Native tribes, said Tim Purdon, a former U.S. Attorney for North Dakota who represents tribal communities as a private practice lawyer.
“There are lots of regulations that the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Department of Interior and places like that have historically interpreted,” he said.
Some critics of the Chevron deference are hopeful its ouster will lead to more consistency in the executive branch.
Under Chevron, the regulatory environment could swing from one extreme to the other when new presidents took office, said Paul Traynor, an assistant professor for the University of North Dakota Law School whose specialties include insurance and corporate law.
“It kind of put both the country and people in sort of a whipsaw,” he said.(His brother, Dan Traynor, is a U.S. District Court Judge for the District of North Dakota.)
The Supreme Court voted 6-3 to overturn the doctrine, with the court’s three liberal judges dissenting.
The court’s opinion, authored by Chief Justice John Roberts, states that reversing Chevron is consistent with the intent of the U.S. Constitution, which gives the federal courts the power to interpret laws.
“The Framers … anticipated that courts would often confront statutory ambiguities and expected that courts would resolve them by exercising independent legal judgment,” Roberts wrote.
The court’s liberal justices countered that federal agencies are better suited to make sense of the instructions Congress gives them.
“Congress knows that it does not — in fact cannot — write perfectly complete regulatory statutes,” Justice Elena Kagan wrote in her dissent. “It knows that those statutes will inevitably contain ambiguities that some other actor will have to resolve, and gaps that some other actor will have to fill. And it would usually prefer that actor to be the responsible agency, not a court.”
The North Dakota courts also have a history of deferring to state agencies’ interpretation of the law, according to Chief Deputy Attorney General Claire Ness.
The question remains as to whether the Supreme Court’s decision will lead North Dakota to reexamine the level of regulatory power it gives those agencies.
“I think that our state regulators … are going to have to very seriously look at the grant of authority that they have been delegated by the Legislature,” Traynor said.
The decision to overturn Chevron comes just two years after another landmark Supreme Court ruling that curbed the executive branch’s regulatory power, commonly referred to as West Virginia v. EPA. In that decision, the Supreme Court struck down an EPA rule that regulated carbon dioxide emissions by power plants. North Dakota was also a plaintiff in the case.
MANNING, N.D. (North Dakota Monitor) — One case of measles was reported in Dunn County, increasing North Dakota’s total number of cases to 36 this year, the Department of Health and Human Services said Friday.
The Dunn County case was believed to have been contracted out of state, health officials said.
North Dakota’s 36 total measles cases confirmed this year now equals the state’s total measles cases reported in 2025, according to the department’s measles dashboard.
Measles cases have been reported across six other counties in North Dakota this year: 23 cases in Pembina County; six cases in Ransom County; three cases in Grand Forks County; and individual cases reported in Traill, Walsh and Williams counties. Five people who contracted measles in 2026 needed to be hospitalized.
Previously, Molly Howell, immunization director of HHS, said being vaccinated against measles is critical to prevent the spread of the disease. She said people with two doses of the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine are 97% protected against contracting the disease.
Cases of measles continue to be reported across the U.S. and Canada, the department said, and people should monitor for symptoms.
Measles symptoms include fever, cough, runny nose and eye irritation, followed by a widespread rash, according to the department. People can transmit the disease for up to four days before a rash develops, according to HHS.
People who believe they may have contracted measles should call a healthcare provider before arriving at a medical clinic for treatment so precautions can be taken to protect other patients and medical staff, HHS said.
As of April 30, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported 1,814 cases of measles across 36 states in 2026.
Submitted Photo
U.S. Air Force veteran Jim Clifford of Minot is shown with the Lincoln Memorial in the background during his trip to the Washington, D.C., area with the Western North Dakota Honor Flight.
U.S. Air Force veteran Jim Clifford of Minot said his recent trip to the Washington, D.C., area with the Western North Dakota Honor Flight was a memorable one.
“The honor is so great,” he said.
Clifford was among more than 100 veterans on the trip from Bismarck, Sunday, April 26, and returning, Monday, April 27. Besides Clifford, several other Minot veterans made the trip.
He said he was very impressed with the N.D. Western Honor Flight organization and the coordination of the trip.
“The coordination is unbelievable. We had a police escort from our hotel room in Arlington, Virginia, to the Capitol. It was right at rush hour,” he said. He said the group of veterans traveled in four buses.
When they arrived at Washington Dulles International Airport, people with signs were standing to the side to greet them.
“It was just unbelievable,” he said. When they left the Bismarck airport, he said, the lobby there was full of people. He said Bismarck comes out really well for the veterans going on these trips and it was the same when the Western N.D. Honor Flight was out of Minot for the first time in April 2025.
Clifford was active duty in the Air Force from 1971-75. For 10 months he served in Taiwan but his Air Force time before and after was at Minot Air Force Base with the fire department.
“My first fire chief was Ken Gillespie,” he said. Gillespie’s son, Ken Gillespie aka Dizzy the Clown, is well known in the Minot area.
After discharge from the Air Force, Clifford continued civil service with the base fire department from 1976-2008, retiring as fire chief.
During the Honor Flight trip, Clifford said, they visited many highlights — veterans’ memorials including World War II, Korean and Vietnam, the U.S. Capitol and the Dulles Air and Space Museum. Congresswoman Julie Fedorchak, R-ND, and Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum met with the group during their visit.
The veterans also visited Arlington National Cemetery.
“We got to see the Changing of the Guard and see them laying two wreaths,” he said.
At a banquet held that night for the veterans at their hotel, the Hyatt Regency in Arlington, he said the sentinel, the lead person for the Changing of the Guard, spoke to them.
“It was a very worthwhile trip. If you’re a veteran, you need to sign up for it,” Clifford said of the Honor Flight.
The Western North Dakota Honor Flight will be the grand marshal of the 2026 North Dakota State Parade Saturday, July 18, in Minot.
A celebration of life is being held in Moorhead on Friday for Liz Anne Conmy, who was killed alongside her partner in a plane crash in Brooklyn Park on Saturday.
The celebration of life will take place at RiverHaven Events Center from 4:30 P.M. to 7:30 P.M.
Those paying their respects are asked not to wear black in accordance with Conmy’s wishes, who said that one shouldn’t wear black to a funeral because it should be a celebration, and are asked to wear something colorful instead.
North Dakota State Representative Conmy and her partner, Dr. Joseph Cass, a retired Mayo Clinic orthopedic surgeon, were killed when the Beechcraft F33A they were in crashed near Crystal airport.
At this time, an investigation into what caused the crash is still ongoing.
SEE North Dakota lawmaker 1 of 2 killed in plane crash near Crystal Airport
Commy, a mother of four with ties to Minnesota State University and the University of St. Thomas, was known for her dedication to environmental and educational issues.
Friends say the couple had a passion for flying and traveled together all over the country, including in Minnesota, where Cass had a lake house.
SEE Friends, colleagues remember North Dakota lawmaker and partner killed in plane crash
Conmy’s political colleagues say she was preparing to run for a second term in the North Dakota House of Representatives.
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