Appeals panel agrees to delay case on coal plant pollution

The Trump administration has successfully delayed a legal fight over enforcing Obama-era restrictions on pollution from coal-fired power plants.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on Thursday granted a request from the Environmental Protection Agency to postpone a planned hearing on 2012 rules requiring energy companies to cut emissions of toxic chemicals. Though the regulations are finalized and already in effect, the new administration told the court it intends to rewrite them.

It is the latest in a string of moves by President Donald Trump's appointees to help companies that profit from burning fossil fuels. Trump has pledged to reverse decades of decline in a U.S. coal industry under threat from such cleaner sources of energy as natural gas, wind turbines and solar farms.