Presidential Freeze May Put SEC Final Climate Rule on Ice

On February 11, 2025, acting SEC Chair Mark Uyeda announced that the commission is reconsidering the final enhanced and standardized climate-related disclosure rule it adopted in March 2024.  Although the final climate rule omitted the highly controversial proposed requirements for SEC-reporting companies to disclose so-called Scope 3 GHG emission information, Uyeda stated that he “continue[s] to question the statutory authority of the Commission to adopt the rule, the need for the rule, and the evaluation of costs and benefits.”

Developments Over the Past Year

In April 2024, the SEC stayed the effectiveness of the final climate rule in light of litigation that challenged the rule’s validity, which is currently consolidated and on appeal in the Eighth Circuit. Uyeda’s February 11 statement, however, directs SEC staff to notify the court of the change in the SEC’s composition and of President Trump’s January 20, 2025, memorandum for the heads of executive departments and agencies titled “Regulatory Freeze Pending Review.”

Specifically, Uyeda, together with the SEC’s other Republican commissioner, now constitute a majority of the SEC commissioners. The president’s January 20 memorandum directs executive agencies to delay the effectiveness of, and give further consideration to, any rules that have not yet become effective. These developments are discussed in more detail in “Immediate Practical Consequences of SEC-Related EOs.”

SEC Staff Communications With the Eighth Circuit   

Uyeda’s February 11 statement also notes that he has directed SEC staff to request that the court not schedule the consolidated final climate rule cases for argument, but instead “provide time for the Commission to deliberate to determine the appropriate next steps in these cases.” These deliberations are likely to result in a complete or partial reversal of the SEC’s promise, when it stayed the rule’s effectiveness last year, to “vigorously defend” the rule.

Uyeda said: “The Commission will promptly notify the Court of its determination about its positions in the litigation.”

Commissioner Crenshaw Counters

Nevertheless, Caroline Crenshaw, the SEC’s sole remaining Democratic commissioner, also published a statement on February 11 in which she expressed her continued full support for the final climate rules and for the SEC’s court filings in the Eighth Circuit that support those rules. Crenshaw also asserted that Uyeda had issued his statement “without the input of the full Commission.” She went on to say: “If, as it appears to be, the acting Chairman’s true intent is to constructively deauthorize the Commission’s pursuit of the appeal to align with his policy preferences, then his statement is an end-run around Commission authority.”