If the ruling is upheld on appeal, the commission could take seven months to a year to make its own decision about the pipeline route. The original route was rejected on the grounds that it went through ecologically fragile wetlands of the Nebraska sand hills. TransCanada revised it and the governor's office approved the revision. But a coalition of environmental advocates and landowners objected and took the matter to court.

Currently, the State Department is reviewing the Final Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement on Keystone XL. That includes evaluating public comments and the assessment of several federal departments, including the Environmental Protection Agency, which has objected to previous impact statements on the pipeline that it labeled inadequate.

Some Republicans, ignoring the legalities involved, responded as expected:



“It is crystal clear that the Obama administration is simply not serious about American energy and American jobs,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said in a statement. He added: “Here’s the single greatest shovel-ready project in America—one that could create thousands of jobs right away—but the President simply isn’t interested. Apparently radical activists carry more weight than Americans desperate to get back on the job.”

If the delay extends beyond the November midterms, as seems highly likely, it could help Democrats. If the president were to approve the pipeline before then, it could hurt Democratic turnout from the party's more liberal and environmentally active members. If he rejected it, the fallout from fossil-fuel state Democrats and union members who support building Keystone could hurt the party's chances. No decision, little impact.