RULES FOR THEE BUT NOT FOR ME AT DOT

Can the Department of Transportation get away with violating the Constitution?? A federal appeals court ruled they can but I filed a brief with the Supreme Court on March 14 asking them to overturn that decision and uphold the due process rights of small businesses against unlawfully issued civil penalty orders.

?In 2022, a career bureaucrat decided that Metal Conversion Technologies, a small Georgia business, violated provisions of the 1,250-page Hazardous Materials Regulations and ordered them to pay a big fine.? Three days before he issued that order, DOT admitted in a federal lawsuit involving another small business that the bureaucrat, Howard McMillan of DOT's Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, was never lawfully appointed and asked the Sixth Circuit to vacate his order.? Metal Conversion had no practical way to know DOT declared their “judge” invalid, but once they found out, they asked another federal court to vacate the order against them.?

?DOT’s response:? we managed to hide our illegal action from you for more than 60 days, so your petition for review was filed too late.? In other words, DOT said “nyah nyah, we sure fooled you!”? And the Atlanta-based 11th Circuit Court of Appeals AGREED with them!? That ruling, of course, encourages all federal agencies to cheat the people they regulate.

On behalf of my client, the Institute for Hazardous Materials Packaging and Certification Testing, I asked the U.S. Supreme Court to stop this blatant injustice.? Along with other “friends of the Court” – the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB), the Buckeye Institute and the Cato Institute – IHMPACT supported a Petition for Certiorari that, if granted, could take the case to the Supreme Court and overturn the 11th Circuit’s outrageous ruling.

This entire pro bono effort would not have been possible without the skill and leadership of the New Civil Liberties Alliance (NCLA).?They and the other three amici, especially the NFIB, have done all the heavy lifting on the court filings.

?Stay tuned for news on the Cert Petition!?