Republican attorneys general in 19 states have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to block several Democratic-governed entities from bringing climate change lawsuits against the oil and gas industry in their own state courts.
The bizarre petition comes as dozens of states and local governments have filed lawsuits arguing that fossil fuel companies mislead the public about the risks of their products worsening climate change.
The lawsuits seek billions of dollars in damages caused by severe storms, wildfires and sea level rise.
For their part, the Republicans’ action specifically seeks to stop lawsuits filed by California, Connecticut, Minnesota, New Jersey and Rhode Island, although other states, tribes, counties and cities have also filed complaints.
The GOP legal team maintains that only the federal government can regulate interstate gas emissions, and that states have no power to apply their own laws to a global atmosphere that extends beyond their borders.
The court filing also maintains that climate-related lawsuits could increase energy costs in other states, including general electricity from natural gas.
“They have no authority to dictate our national energy policy,” Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall said in a statement Thursday announcing the 19-state lawsuit. “If the Supreme Court allows them to continue, California and its allies will jeopardize access to affordable energy for all Americans.”
The California attorney general’s office denounced the Republican request to the Supreme Court as baseless and promised to pursue its case against the oil and gas companies, AP News reported.
Likewise, William Tong, Attorney General of Connecticut, mocked it as “pure partisan political theater.” And Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison called the Republican initiative “absurd” and noted that the Court allowed the state’s case to proceed in a Minnesota court.
Lawsuits typically begin in district courts before reaching the Supreme Court on appeal. However, the Constitution allows some cases to begin in the high court when multiple states are involved. The Supreme Court has the power to reject a request for original jurisdiction.
The request by Republican prosecutors is “very unusual” and is used more frequently in state lawsuits over water rights, not “as an attempt to close lawsuits from other states,” said the director of the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law. at Columbia University in New York, Michael Gerrard.
States joining Alabama’s request include Alaska, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Utah, West Virginia and Wyoming.
The Supreme Court could intervene in climate change lawsuits through other means. Already pending before the high court is a separate petition by oil industry defendants to overturn a Hawaii Supreme Court decision that allowed a climate change lawsuit brought by Honolulu to move forward in state court.
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