Whether a court of appeals has jurisdiction to review a Surface Transportation Board ruling

QUESTIONS PRESENTED The Surface Transportation Board (STB or Board) is authorized by statute to exempt certain transactions involving rail carriers from the antitrust laws and other laws. 49 U.S.C. §§ 10502, 11321. Under the statutory and regulatory scheme, the Board must exempt “[t]ransactions within a corporate family that do not result in adverse changes in service levels, significant operational changes, or a change in the competitive balance with carriers outside the corporate family.” 49 C.F.R. § 1180.2(d)(8). Ordinarily, the courts of appeals have exclusive jurisdiction under the Administrative Orders Review Act (Hobbs Act) to review STB decisions. 28 U.S.C. §§ 2321(a), 2342(5). But 28 U.S.C. § 1336(b) creates a narrow exception when a district court refers a question to the Board: “the court which referred the question or issue shall have exclusive jurisdiction” to review the Board’s ruling. 28 U.S.C. § 1336(b). The questions presented are: 1. Whether a court of appeals has jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. §§ 2321(a) and 2342(5) to review a ruling of the Surface Transportation Board, when that ruling addresses a question that was not referred to the Board by a district court but is contained in a decision with an additional, separate ruling that does address a question referred to the Board by a district court. 2. Whether the court of appeals erred, contravening Kisor v. Wilkie, 139 S. Ct. 2400 (2019), by effectively deferring to the STB’s erroneous interpretation of an unambiguous regulation, 49 C.F.R. § 1180.2(d)(8), that wrote an atextual prior-authorization requirement into that regulation.