June 6, 2025 — More than a dozen states, including Massachusetts, have an uphill battle if they’re to succeed in their legal efforts to lift President Donald Trump’s memorandum against offshore wind development.
Attorneys for the states of Massachusetts and New York appeared on Thursday before federal Judge William G. Young, prepared to argue that he should grant a preliminary injunction against the Trump administration’s effective freeze of offshore wind permitting. But the hearing didn’t happen, with the judge “collapsing” the injunction motion.
Young said he needed more specificity from the states on the harm they’ve incurred and the alleged legal violations by federal agencies. The case will be heard again next week, but instead, with a hearing on a motion to dismiss it. (The judge is treating the Trump administration’s filing opposing a preliminary injunction as a motion to dismiss the case.)
“I’m not clear again… that I understand what the specific harm is,” Young said, noting he understands there have been economic impacts on “an important industry.” “But in the context of litigation, I need, I think, some more specificity as to what are the specific harms to specific projects in specific states.”
“It would appear both from the record and from the president’s public statements that he’s opposed as a matter of policy to offshore wind farm energy generation. I think that’s indisputable,” Young continued.
In that vein, Young asked whether the requisite licenses would be issued by the federal government following a court ruling, given the administration’s position on wind. Experts interpreted “licensing” to regard permitting and permits.
Timothy Fox, an analyst at ClearView Energy Partners, said Young’s remarks “strongly suggested that the Trump Administration may prevail.”
“Perhaps most significant,” Fox said by email on Thursday, the judge appeared to declare that ‘the power to license is the power to withhold a license.’”
Young’s points echoed some of those raised by the Trump administration in its May 29 filing opposing the preliminary injunction request.
“Plaintiffs and Intervenor fail to show standing, fail to identify any final agency action on which to base their claims, fail to identify statutory violations on the part of Defendants, disregard the considerable agency discretion and flexibility in the relevant statutory regimes, and otherwise fail to state a claim,” stated the U.S. Department of Justice.