The Trump administration is freezing its plan to expand offshore oil drilling off the Atlantic coast.

Interior Secretary David Bernhardt told the Wall Street Journal, in an interview published Thursday, that the agency would not move forward until federal courts decide on a challenge to the administration's move to open the Arctic Ocean and parts of the Atlantic Ocean to drilling.

In March, A federal judge in Alaska reinstated an Obama-era ban on oil and gas activity in the Arctic and Atlantic oceans, ruling that President Donald Trump would need Congress to pass legislation to end the ban.

The ruling may force the Interior Department to wait until a final judgment, Bernhardt said.

"By the time the court rules, that may be discombobulating to our plan," the secretary said. "What if you guess wrong? ... I'm not sure that's a very satisfactory and responsible use of resources."

The holding pattern puts an unexpected – if perhaps temporary – halt to a Trump administration plan to expand offshore oil and gas development. Last year, the Interior Department in a five-year plan proposed opening as much as 90% of offshore regions to drilling. A plan instituted under the Obama administration, by comparison, would have opened 6% of offshore areas for drilling.

The Trump proposal, though cheered by oil and gas firms, also provoked a backlash from some Republicans as well as Democrats, especially governors and lawmakers in coastal states concerned about protecting both their shorelines and local fishing industries.

