Review of Agency Determinations of Fact

One of agencies' core competencies is in the gathering and processing of facts. This is the case both for adjudications, which very often turn solely on the facts that an agency finds, and for rulemaking, which very often turns on facts that support the policy choices that an agency is making. Nevertheless, Congress in the APA (and, again, in many special review statutes) provided for court review of agency determinations of facts. Section 706(2)(E) is widely understood as providing the standard of review for courts engaged in this task. Consistent with the appellate review model, the "substantial evidence" standard has always been considered to be relatively deferential.  But just like with arbitrariness review, there is plenty of room for debate about precisely what this somewhat vague language requires.