"Even if you never work with health plans, a case involving a 'No Surprises Act' rule raises a question that matters for all situations in which Congress delegates to an executive agency a power to make a legislative rule.
"An appeals court decided that some parts of a rule to implement Congress's 'No Surprises Act' are contrary to law, and vacated those parts. Beyond not applying those parts in
deciding the litigants' dispute, the court might have nullified those parts of the rule from applying to anyone, anywhere in the United States.
"The Solicitor General argues that the Administrative Procedure Act's scope-of-review provision [5 U.S.C. Section 706] for a court '[t]o the extent necessary to decision' to 'hold unlawful and set aside agency action, findings, and conclusions found to be. .. not in
accordance with law' does not empower a court to vacate an agency rule as to everyone. Rather, a court's relief properly applies only to the litigants in the particular dispute the court has power to decide. Further, the Solicitor General argues: '[E]ven if the Court were to hold that vacatur is a permissible remedy under the APA, [the Court] should treat vacatur as an equitable remedy subject to
ordinary equitable principles.' Among those principles, 'remedies 'ordinarily operate with respect to specific parties,' rather than 'on legal rules in the abstract[.]'' HHS. v. Texas Medical Ass'n, No. 26-491 (U.S., cert. petition filed Oct. 14, 2026).
"If the Supreme Court grants review and decides what the Solicitor General asks for, a Federal district court's decision -- even one declaring an agency rule contrary to law -- would have no effect beyond the particular case's litigants. An appeals court's nonprecedential decision would have no effect beyond the particular case's
litigants. An appeals court's precedent would affect only cases litigated in a district in that circuit's geographic range. (For example, an Eleventh Circuit precedent affects only districts in Alabama, Florida, and Georgia.) Others arguing that an agency's rule is contrary to law would need to litigate those issues case-by-case.
"What's meant as national law might not become uniform until an appropriate case is
litigated in the Supreme Court and is decided by that Court's reasoned opinion. Some people might find that unsettling. But it's not much different than what can happen with courts interpreting a statute that lacks a call for an executive agency to make a legislative rule."
