Biden ban on offshore drilling in vast areas was illegal, court rules

U.S. District Judge James Cain in Lake Charles, Louisiana, sided with Republican states and oil and gas industry groups that sued to block Biden's move to protect all federal waters off the East and West coasts, the eastern Gulf of Mexico and portions of the northern Bering Sea in Alaska. Biden, on one of his final days in office, used his authority under the 70-year-old Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act to withdraw the areas. Cain ruled Biden's withdrawal was illegal because it was intended to be permanent, and said withdrawals by former President Barack Obama were similar.