An effort to change California laws that require pork sold in the state to come from pigs that were raised in sufficient living space has been shot down for the second time at the hands of the U.S. Supreme Court.

According to The Hill, Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh reportedly indicated that he was ready to take up the case, but as is usual in such requests, he nor any other justices explained the reasoning for rejecting the challenge. 

The high court upheld the law when it was challenged two years ago after pork famers and national pork organizations challenged the ridiculous law.

While those groups ultimately conceded certain legal arguments regarding the challenge to the state law, it was expected that the Iowa Pork Producers Association would eventually pick up where they left off.

What's going on?

The problem is that the law, which "prohibits pork sold in the state if the breeding pig had less than 24 square feet of usable floor space" essentially applies across the nation given that California buys as much pork as it does.

The law, passed in 2018 and known as Proposition 12, has created a hardship on pork farmers in both California and the rest of the country, and many anticipated a potential change in the laws if the conservative majority Supreme Court would have taken another look at it.

According to court reports, the legal challenge "concerns a doctrine rooted in the Constitution’s command that Congress holds the power to regulate interstate commerce," as The Hill reported.

The outlet added:

Known as the dormant Commerce Clause, the doctrine restricts states from impeding that power by discriminating purposefully against out-of-state economic interests.

However, during the first challenge to the case two years ago, "the challengers didn’t argue that Proposition 12 discriminated against other states."

The Hill added:

The Iowa-based group advanced a discrimination claim that revolves around an earlier animal welfare measure that applies to California farmers only. That measure gave the in-state farmers six years to comply, but Proposition 12 gave out-of-state farmers less than six weeks.

Pork producers speak out

The Iowa Pork Producers, in their challenge, explained their new argument.

“If issues of ‘morality’ can drive the regulation of out-of-state industry (as was supposedly the case with Proposition 12), why couldn’t future regulation be based on minimum wage policies of sister States, or employees’ immigration status, or any other hot-button social issue of the day? The Framers prohibited precisely this type of discriminatory and overly onerous out-of-state regulation," the group wrote.

Notably, California had urged the high court to pass on the case, arguing the previous attempt failed because their argument lacked merit.

Only time will tell if the groups continue to fight the law, which many believe is beyond silly.