Three AGs Filed Amicus Brief Supporting Michigan’s Authority Over Public Trust Waters

NOVEMBER 12, 2019

Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul and California Attorney General Xavier Becerra filed an amicus brief in support of Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel’s lawsuit seeking to permanently decommission an aging oil pipeline that runs along the bottom of the Straits of Mackinac between Lakes Michigan and Huron. In the lawsuit against the pipeline’s owner, Enbridge Inc., AG Nessel argued that the pipeline violates the public trust doctrine, is a common law public nuisance, and violates state environmental laws because it is likely to pollute the lakes. A central issue of the case is whether the public trust doctrine can be preempted by either the Pipeline Safety Act or the U.S. Coast Guard’s general authority over navigable waters. In their brief, the attorneys general said that “it is beyond dispute that the doctrine universally applies to submerged lands beneath navigable waters, and confers upon the states permanent and un-diminishable authority over those lands.”