On March 24, 2025, the NAM filed an amicus brief urging the U.S. Supreme Court to address a circuit split concerning federal officer removal jurisdiction. This case is one of over 40 cases filed by a group of Louisiana parishes in state court seeking relief for alleged damage to Louisiana’s coastal environment. The plaintiffs assert that the defendants—energy manufacturers—violated state environmental laws by violating or failing to obtain a use permit for oil production activities on the Louisiana coast. Importantly, the defendants were acting, in part, pursuant to contracts with the government to refine crude oil into high-octane aviation gasoline to support the Allies in WWII. Because federal courts have jurisdiction over civil actions against “any person acting under [an] officer” of the United States “for or relating to any act under color of such office,” the defendants removed the case to federal court. Although a 5th Circuit panel agreed that the defendants acted under a federal officer, it split on whether the defendants’ production of crude oil “relat[ed] to” their government contracts. The majority held that a removing party must identify a “relevant federal directive” for a federal court to exercise federal officer removal jurisdiction and the defendants’ oil production lacked a sufficient connection with directives in their federal refinery contracts. The defendants petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to review the case, and the Court granted this petition on June 16, 2025.
On September 21, 2025, the NAM filed a merits brief in support of the defendants' position, marking our fifth filing in the course of the litigation. In our brief, we argue that federal contractors have long relied on the protection of the federal officer removal statute when transacting with the government, and that a “relevant federal directive” requirement unduly narrows the text of the statute, which broadly applies to all claims “relating to” work under a federal officer. Without federal officer removal, the NAM argues, federal contractors would be hesitant to take on work that is nationally important but locally unpopular.