NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Metro Nashville’s court fight against a 2023 state law aimed at the Nashville International Airport Authority board is over, after the Tennessee Supreme Court threw out the case on Monday.
The justices said the challenge was moot. The original law reached only metro governments with more than 500,000 people, which in practice meant Nashville. Metro argued it broke the Local Legislation Clause of the state constitution, and a three-judge trial panel agreed, as did the Court of Appeals.
After the high court heard the case, though, the General Assembly rewrote the law this year so it covers every metropolitan airport authority and some regional ones, including those serving Chattanooga, Memphis, Knoxville and the Tri-Cities. That change, the court found, ended the dispute over the first version. The justices vacated the lower-court rulings, told the trial court to dismiss the case and rejected Metro’s claim that the case should stay alive because lawmakers might do the same thing again.
The law gives state officials most of the appointments to the airport board. Metro had also argued that federal rules require the Federal Aviation Administration to sign off on a change in how the airport is run if the sitting board objects.
The fight is not fully finished. Metro and the airport authority itself, the Metropolitan Nashville Airport Authority, have filed a separate challenge to the 2026 law, which would remove existing airport boards and rebuild them. That case is still pending, and the ruling could also shape a similar lawsuit over the Chattanooga airport.
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Filed under: Nashville TN Politics News
