Judge rejects Trump administration’s bid to block Hawaii’s climate change lawsuit

In a setback to the Trump administration’s extraordinary legal campaign against climate action, a federal judge has thrown out a Justice Department lawsuit seeking to prevent the state of Hawaii from suing oil companies for damages.

Trump administration lawyers have argued that Hawaii, by trying to sue fossil fuel companies, is standing in the way of national efforts to secure reliable sources of domestic energy.

But Judge Helen Gillmor of the U.S. District Court for the District of Hawaii ruled Wednesday that such a claim was too speculative to be the basis of a lawsuit.

“The alleged injury to the United States depends on multiple layers of unforeseeable future events,” Gillmor wrote, noting that the Trump administration filed the case without even seeing Hawaii’s lawsuit (the state filed it the next day). The nature of the lawsuit, whether Hawaii will prevail, what the fossil fuel industry will do in response and how that response will affect the United States are all unknown, the judge said.

“Allegations of such an unpredictable sequence of events are nothing more than speculation at this point,” Gillmore wrote, dismissing the claim with prejudice. This means that the Ministry of Justice can appeal to a higher court, but cannot amend and try to reopen the case.

It was the second decision and second defeat for the Trump administration in seven lawsuits it has brought to block state and local climate action. They contribute to the Trump administration’s loss in the federal courts; Inside Climate News follows environmental lawsuits features the Trump administration with 17 losses and five wins in rulings so far, including its efforts to overhaul environmental policy. No verdict has yet been reached in 48 cases—which includes cases by the Trump administration challenging climate laws in Vermont, New York and California, and local ordinances in Petaluma and Morgan Hill, California.

The decision means Hawaii can continue on its own for the time being litigation in state court against BP, Exxon Mobil, Shell and other oil companies for negligence, nuisance, trespass and damage to “public trust resources”. The latter claim was based on Hawaii’s constitution, which states that such resources are held by the state in trust for the benefit of its citizens.

“The climate crisis is here, and Hawaii taxpayers should not have to foot the bill when fossil fuel companies misled and failed to warn consumers about the climate dangers lurking in their products,” Gov. Josh Green said in statement after the Gillmore ruling. “A climate fraud lawsuit is about holding those parties accountable and shifting the costs of surviving the climate crisis where they belong.”

First Deputy Assistant Attorney General Adam Gustafson of the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division had no immediate response on whether the Trump administration would appeal.

“We disagree with the Hawaii District Court’s ruling, which ignored Supreme Court precedent regarding the United States’ interest in the supremacy of federal law,” he said in an emailed statement. “We are exploring all options.”

In January, U.S. District Judge Jane Beckering dismissed a similar lawsuit by the Trump administration seeking to block Michigan’s lawsuit against fossil fuel companies. In that ruling, Beckering detailed the history of state attorney general litigation and its importance in addressing the harms of tobacco, asbestos, lead paint and opioids. She placed the climate change lawsuits in what she called “a decades-long history of public interest lawsuits filed by state attorneys general against national industry groups in areas heavily regulated by the federal government.”

Lawsuits in Hawaii and Michigan against fossil fuel companies are among the approx 30 climate lawsuits there is currently litigation against fossil fuel companies. Ironically, even as the Justice Department sought to block lawsuits in Hawaii and Michigan, the EPA’s rollback of climate policy during President Donald Trump’s current term could fuel such litigation. In 2010, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously that fossil fuel companies were protected from certain types of state lawsuits because the federal government had responsibility for regulating carbon emissions under the Clean Air Act, so preempting state action. States are now likely to argue that the Trump administration has removed that shield cancellation of findings on endangerment.

Fossil fuel companies could regain some protections when the Supreme Court hears later this year case involving Boulder, Colorado’s climate claims against the fossil fuel industry. Republican lawmakers in a number of states and in Congress are too suppression of laws protect fossil fuel companies from climate liability cases.

But federal court decisions in Hawaii and Michigan make it unlikely that the Justice Department will be able to protect fossil fuel companies by arguing that state lawsuits are a risk to Trump’s energy dominance policies.

“The United States’ lawsuit was an example of gross federal overreach,” Hawaii Attorney General Anne Lopez said after the decision. “My department will continue to fight deceptive practices that harm Hawaii’s public health, natural resources and economy.”