On Sept. 3, 2014, with its decision in Property Casualty Insurers Ass'n of America v. Donovan, __F.Supp.2d__, 2104 WL 4377570 (N.D. Ill. 2014), the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois waded into the ongoing battle between the insurance industry and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) over HUD's authority to adopt a disparate impact rule for the provision of homeowners insurance. This skirmish resulted in a draw, with both sides being sent back to retrench. The court remanded the disparate impact rule to HUD for further rulemaking, but declined to hear claims by Property Casualty Insurers (PCI) that HUD's disparate impact rule was a violation of the McCarran-Ferguson Act, 15 U.S.C. §1011.
Two months later, on Nov. 3, 2014, in American Insurance Ass'n v. U.S. Dep't of Housing and Urban Development, __ F.Supp. __ (D.D.C. 2014), the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia went even further, handing a resounding victory to the American Insurance Association (AIA) by finding that HUD's disparate impact rule exceeded its statutory authority. The D.C. District Court decision purported to vacate the disparate impact rule.
