## Facts

- Eric Friedman, a commercial pilot with insulin-treated diabetes mellitus (ITDM), held a third-class FAA medical certificate for noncommercial flying.
- Friedman applied for a first-class medical certificate required to serve as a commercial airline pilot.
- FAA medical rules generally disqualify insulin-dependent diabetes but allow special issuance when the applicant shows safe performance.
- During processing, the FAA required Friedman to complete 90 days of continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) and submit the data.
- Friedman provided letters from treating physicians and an expert panel stating CGM was not medically necessary for his care and could be less accurate than other measurements he used.
- The FAA repeatedly demanded CGM data, set deadlines, and warned it would deny the application without the data, but did not issue a formal grant or denial and stated the application remained under consideration.
- The FAA continued issuing Friedman third-class certificates while refusing to proceed on the first-class request without CGM, leaving the application effectively stalled.

## Issues

1. Whether the FAA’s refusal to process the first-class application without 90 days of CGM data, without issuing a formal denial, constituted final agency action (a reviewable final order).
2. Whether the FAA’s insistence on CGM as a precondition for first-class certification, given the record presented, was arbitrary and capricious for lack of adequate justification.

## Decision

- The D.C. Circuit held the FAA’s “unwavering position” constituted final agency action because it functionally amounted to a constructive denial that determined Friedman’s ability to obtain first-class certification.
- The court held the FAA had not provided an adequate, reasoned explanation in the record to justify conditioning first-class certification on 90 days of CGM data.
- The court remanded to the FAA to provide reasons supporting its effective denial and its CGM requirement.

## Legal Principles

- An agency action is final, and therefore reviewable, when it represents the consummation of the agency’s decisionmaking and determines rights or obligations or produces legal consequences; formal labeling is not required.
- Conditional “non-action” can be a constructive denial where the agency’s position is fixed and blocks the applicant from obtaining the requested benefit.
- Even under broad aviation safety authority, the FAA must provide a reasoned, evidence-based explanation for specific medical-data demands imposed on an individual applicant.
- Under arbitrary-and-capricious review, an agency bears the burden to justify its requirements with rational explanation tied to the administrative record.

## Conclusion

The court treated the FAA’s refusal to proceed without CGM as a final, reviewable constructive denial and remanded because the FAA had not adequately explained, on the record, why 90 days of CGM data was necessary to evaluate Friedman’s first-class medical certification request.


Friedman v. Fed. Aviation Admin., 841 F.3d 537 (D.C. Cir. 2016)