Whether Events After the Filing of an Initial Complaint May Cure an Article III Standing Defect: The D.C. Circuit’s Approach

On December 7, 2018, in Scahill v. District of Columbia, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit held that a plaintiff may cure an Ar-ticle III standing defect through an amended pleading alleging facts that arose after the filing of the original complaint. In so doing, the D.C. Circuit joined an expand-ing plurality of the federal appellate courts in rejecting the alternative approach that requires a plaintiff lacking standing at the outset of a lawsuit to file a new lawsuit when events subsequent to filing the original complaint have corrected any stand-ing deficiency. This Comment assesses the D.C. Circuit’s decision and argues that the inefficient and needlessly formalistic approach of a shrinking minority of the circuits, which Scahill discards, ought to be abandoned entirely.