The Democrats had handed off the ball to the environmentalists over the building of a border wall. They lost the case in lower court and were challenging that ruling with the Supreme Court. SCOTUS will not accept frivolous cases.
They won’t take the case up if they see you have no chance of winning. But, only four judges need to vote in favor of taking the case up, so that means at least one liberal judge agreed the case had no merit. The enviros never stood a chance because a 1996 gave the power to waive environmental law to the Attorney General.
Later that authorization went to the Secretary of Homeland Security. You can’t fight it in court, only the legislature.
“It’s disappointing that the Supreme Court won’t consider this important constitutional issue,” Brian Segee, a senior attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD), told The Daily Caller News Foundation by email. “Trump has abused his power to wreak havoc along the border to score political points. He’s illegally sweeping aside bedrock environmental and public health laws. We’ll continue to fight Trump’s dangerous wall in the courts and in Congress.”
A 1996 law authorized the attorney general (and later the Homeland Security secretary) to build border barriers to deter illegal immigration. In that connection, the law gave the Department of Homeland Security secretary power to exempt certain border projects from environmental laws like the Endangered Species Act, as well as other legal rules, to ensure quick construction.
The law also restricts the jurisdiction of courts to hear legal challenges to the secretary’s waivers, and provides that such lawsuits must be lodged on an accelerated timetable.
Better luck next time.