WSJ: Justice Jackson’s Strange Lament: In dissent she feeds a ‘perception’ about the Supreme Court she admits is wrong.

The Supreme Court ruled 7-2 Friday that oil refiners can challenge California’s electric-vehicle mandate. The decision shouldn’t have been controversial, but Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson’s dissent accusing her colleagues of favoring “moneyed interests” deserves a rebuttal.

Refiners challenged a 2013 Environmental Protection Agency waiver (Diamond Alternative Energy v. EPA) letting California impose its own greenhouse gas emissions standards and EV quotas. The Biden Administration issued a separate waiver that applies through 2035, which President Trump signed a Congressional resolution last week to repeal.

To sue in federal court, plaintiffs must demonstrate they are likely to suffer a concrete injury that can be redressed by judicial action. California and other Democratic-led states sought to have the case tossed by arguing that refiners lacked legal standing because they wouldn’t be harmed by the state’s emissions rules. Say what?

The express purpose of California’s regulations is to reduce the consumption of gasoline that the companies produce. Yet a D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals panel agreed with California’s self-contradictory argument, holding that auto makers wouldn’t make more gas-powered cars if the EPA waiver were overturned owing to “surging consumer demand” for EVs.

As Justice Brett Kavanaugh notes in the majority opinion, “EPA’s and California’s own actions—their statements, their enforcement decisions, their litigation positions—undermine the central premise of their redressability argument.” Lo, if blocking the regulations wouldn’t have an impact, why are EPA and California seeking to defend and enforce them?

Why, indeed?