Trump Administration To Join Supreme Court Arguments Against Colorado County’s Climate Change Lawsuit

The Supreme Court will allow the Trump administration’s solicitor general to participate in oral arguments in Suncor Energy Inc. v. County Commissioners of Boulder County, a landmark case over whether state and local governments can sue fossil fuel companies for climate change damages.The case — which also includes Exxon Mobil — will open the court’s fall term on October 5 and could have far-reaching implications involving stat’s rights under the Constitution. Approximately 60 states and localities have brought near-identical suits to hold fossil-fuel producers liable for alleged past and future climate-related harms in those places.Boulder’s lawsuit alleges that Exxon Mobil and Suncor Energy misled the public about climate change risks while knowingly producing and promoting fossil fuels that contributed to the problem. The county argues these companies should help cover millions of dollars in costs that state and local governments incur to address climate change impacts, including injuries and damages caused by wildfires, pests, droughts, extreme heat, and flooding.The Colorado Supreme Court ruled that federal law did not override Boulder’s state-law claims. The state’s high court, however, has not ruled on the merits of the case.The companies asked the Nine to take the case and argued that state-law claims are superseded by federal environmental laws, including the Clean Air Act. “Seeking injury in the form of physical harms allegedly caused by global emissions, as petitioners do, is just an indirect method of regulating interstate and international emissions,” lawyers for the companies wrote in a brief. The Supreme Court, in February, agreed to hear the case.The companies say the lawsuit seeks to “impose untold damages” for the physical and economic effects of climate change. If those types of cases are permitted at the state level, the oil industry could be at risk of billions of dollars in damages.The federal government is not a direct party to the lawsuit but asked to get involved because it “has a substantial interest in the proper interpretation of the federal constitution and statutory provisions involved.”The Trump administration, in May, filed a “friend of the court” brief arguing that individual states shouldn’t be able to regulate nationwide energy policy.“Allowing Colorado to deem the effects of the companies’ worldwide conduct tortious ‘cannot be reconciled with the decision-making scheme Congress enacted’ in the Clean Air Act, which precludes any such role for a single State,” lawyers for the Trump administration wrote in their filing.On Friday, the Supreme Court released an order granting a motion allowing the solicitor general, John Sauer, to participate in the oral argument.The questions justices will consider is if the climate cases can go forward at all and whether climate policy can be set from state courts. A decision in the case is expected to come before the end of the year.

Trump Administration To Join Supreme Court Arguments Against Colorado County’s Climate Change Lawsuit

Trump Administration To Join Supreme Court Arguments Against Colorado County’s Climate Change Lawsuit

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