Summer only just began last month, yet 96 percent of the U.S. population has already faced at least one extreme weather alert this “danger season” — the warm months when climate-driven weather extremes in the U.S. tend to concentrate and do greatest harm.
Simultaneously, during last month’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach urged Congress to rewrite the Clean Air Act to block states from regulating fossil fuel emissions.
Kobach also joined a group of 16 state attorneys general on a letter to U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi asking the Department of Justice to create a “liability shield” exempting fossil fuel companies from being held accountable for their deliberate climate deception and the worsening climate crisis.
All signees are members of the Republican Attorneys General Association, to which the American Petroleum Institute is a top 10 donor.
These blatant attempts to grant polluters nationwide immunity show just how far some officials will go to deny communities their day in court. In recent years, dozens of climate cases have been filed in the U.S., as litigation has become an increasingly important pathway for holding the fossil fuel industry accountable.
As climate accountability campaign director at the Union of Concerned Scientists, I have spent years documenting Big Oil’s “Decades of Deceit,” which is the title of our May report.
Currently, one in four people in the U.S. resides in a city, state or Tribal Nation suing fossil fuel companies for climate deceit, disinformation or damages. These cases threaten the fossil fuel industry’s business model, and Big Oil knows it. That’s why they are seeking to undercut the judicial system and evade legal responsibility.
This isn’t the first time fossil fuel companies and their allies have sought legal immunity, but the stakes are higher than ever, given their undue influence within Congress and the White House, as well as the number of active climate accountability lawsuits across the country.
President Trump’s recent executive order attacking states’ power to protect their residents from the climate crisis is a troubling development, as are Justice Department lawsuits preemptively seeking to block climate litigation or roll back four states’ Superfund-style laws.
Our Decades of Deceit report underscores why fossil fuel companies fear legal accountability and have used procedural tactics to delay these lawsuits for years.
The report paints a damning portrait of corporate malfeasance and emphasizes the need for Congress and the Trump administration to preserve state-level policymaking and protect access to justice through state courts for those harmed by fossil fuel industry misconduct.
Dozens of lawsuits cite our organization’s analyses in arguing to hold companies like ExxonMobil, Shell, BP and Chevron accountable for climate disinformation and ensuing damages.
Underpinning these cases is robust evidence highlighted in our report, which reveals the extent to which major fossil fuel companies have misled people and sowed doubt about relevant science to delay climate action while continuing to profit at the public’s expense.
By the early 1980s, these companies understood climate change impacts could be catastrophic. They knew to a high degree of accuracy the danger their products posed to people and the planet.
For example, a confidential 1988 Shell report warned that “By the time the global warming becomes detectable it could be too late to take effective countermeasures to reduce the effects or even to stabilize the situation.”
Instead of changing course, these companies planned, funded and continued to engage in deliberate disinformation campaigns. In 2021, former ExxonMobil Senior Director of Government Affairs Keith McCoy admitted the company used front groups to “aggressively fight” against climate science.
Now, as people and communities seek accountability, the industry is pleading for an escape hatch.
Big Oil doesn’t want this damning evidence to be presented in court. That’s why it is seeking help from several states’ highest law enforcement officials, who are attempting to create an extrajudicial avenue for their allies while sacrificing their own constituents’ ability to access justice.
As our work illustrates, these companies cannot be trusted to do the right thing. Just as the U.S. needs laws to protect public health, it needs to be able to enforce laws when corporations knowingly cause harm.
Given dangerous backtracking by the Trump administration and delayed, insufficient climate action by Congress, the courts are an increasingly important avenue for communities seeking redress for damages caused by climate disinformation.
Our elected representatives must stand strong against liability waivers and preserve the rights of states and communities to make polluters pay.
Kathy Mulvey is the accountability campaign director for the climate and energy team at the Union of Concerned Scientists.
