Fifteen states and one Texas county went to federal appeals court on Monday, asking judges to set aside the environmental review the FAA now uses to clear commercial drone package delivery across the country. The petition, filed September 28, 2026, in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, challenges the agency's decision to rely on a single national environmental study rather than market-by-market studies.

The filing is thin by design. It is a petition for review under Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 15, a notice that starts a case, not a brief that argues one. The substance of the states' objections comes from a press release issued the same day by California Attorney General Rob Bonta's office.

What was filed, and against whom

The petitioners are New York, Arizona, California, Colorado, Delaware, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Washington and Wisconsin, plus Harris County, Texas. The respondents are the FAA, Administrator Bryan Bedford, the U.S. Department of Transportation and Secretary Sean Duffy. New York Attorney General Letitia James's office is counsel, with Solicitor General Barbara D. Underwood, Deputy Solicitor General Andrea Oser and Assistant Solicitor General Blair J. Greenwald named on the petition.

The document under challenge is the "Final Programmatic Environmental Assessment, Finding of No Significant Impact, and Record of Decision for Drone Package Delivery Operations in the United States," dated July 28, 2026. The FAA announced its availability on July 30 at 91 Fed. Reg. 48,208.

The petition cites 49 U.S.C. 46110, 5 U.S.C. 702 and FRAP 15. It also points to page F-18 of the final programmatic assessment, where the FAA itself says the document "constitutes a final agency action and a final order" subject to exclusive judicial review by the courts of appeals. That matters procedurally: the agency has, in effect, told challengers where to go. The petitioners say venue is proper in the Second Circuit because at least one of them resides in New York.

Why day 62

According to DroneXL, the FAA's decision document gave challengers 60 days from July 28, and that window ran out on Saturday, September 26. Under FRAP 26(a), a deadline that lands on a weekend rolls to the next business day, so a petition dated Monday, September 28, is timely. The petition invokes Rule 26(a) and 49 U.S.C. 46110(a) for timeliness. DroneXL also noted that one early report named Travis County as the local-government petitioner; the petition itself says Harris County.

What the states say is wrong

Bonta's office says the FAA violated the National Environmental Policy Act's requirement that agencies take a "hard look" at environmental consequences. In the release, the assessment "falls far short of properly analyzing the environmental impacts that drone package delivery operations may have." It describes nationwide deliveries "to occur at future points in time without meaningful contextual information about the impacted communities or environment," and, in the release's words, "does not adequately address the potential safety risks or other environmental impacts."

Lawyer Monthly's account of the coalition's position adds noise, safety and privacy as concerns as drone activity expands over residential and other populated areas. Because the petition contains no argument, those specifics will have to be developed in briefing.

The release also lays out the operating envelope: flights generally under 400 feet, packages under five pounds, delivered by rope drop, hover drop or full-stop landing. It notes that Amazon began Prime Air deliveries in Lockeford, California, in 2022 and seeks to expand to additional cities such as Tracy, California.

The mechanism at stake

According to DroneXL, the July 28 finding of no significant impact lets the FAA approve new Part 135 delivery markets against one national study rather than a fresh environmental assessment for each. That is the shortcut the states want removed. DroneXL reports that seventeen state attorneys general had demanded a full environmental impact statement, a more demanding review, in a January comment letter, and lost.

The FAA's position, as described by Lawyer Monthly, is that the programmatic review is a common environmental foundation. The agency acknowledges that exact sites become clear only when operators seek authorization, and says it will allow project-specific analysis where a proposal is not adequately covered by the national document. The states' argument, in Bonta's framing, is that a national overview without community-level context cannot substitute for that local look.

What the challenge does not do

Lawyer Monthly reports that the challenge does not ask the court simply to declare drone delivery unlawful. It targets the environmental analysis the FAA intends to rely on for future operator applications. A win for the states would presumably send the agency back to redo or supplement the review; it would not, on the face of the petition, ground existing operations. DroneXL adds that no stay has been requested, so approvals continue for now.

What happens next

Per DroneXL, the FAA has not yet filed the administrative record and the court has not set a briefing schedule. The FAA did not respond to Reuters' request for comment, DroneXL reports. Until briefs arrive, the states' legal theories beyond the "hard look" claim remain unstated, and the FAA's defense in court is unknown, though Lawyer Monthly says the agency maintains its assessment covered the impact categories its NEPA procedures require and that mitigation measures are sufficient to avoid significant effects.

Why It Matters

Programmatic environmental reviews are a way to avoid repeating the same analysis for every approval. For drone delivery, the FAA's national document is the environmental foundation for expanding Part 135 operations without a fresh assessment in each new market. If the Second Circuit vacates it, operators could face slower, market-specific environmental work, while a ruling for the FAA would cement the national approach at the moment delivery networks are scaling.

The case tests whether courts will accept a single national study as a "hard look" for a service whose impacts are inherently local: noise over particular neighborhoods, flight paths over particular schools and yards. The FAA's own acknowledgment that exact sites become clear only at authorization gives the states a ready hook. Expect the fight to turn on whether the promise of project-specific analysis where needed is enough to satisfy NEPA.

This is distinct from local disputes over individual Amazon sites and from the rulemaking track for routine beyond-visual-line-of-sight flight. It goes at the federal environmental clearance that sits underneath both.

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