ST. PAUL, Minn. – The state attorney general, Keith Ellison, was pleased but not surprised that the U.S. Supreme Court has left his pioneering climate-change case against Big Oil to be decided in state courts. The Supreme Court ruling was a setback for the American Petroleum Institute, ExxonMobil and three subsidiaries of Koch Industries. Responding to the Supreme Court ruling, Ellison said it aligns with 25 previous federal court decisions across the country that have found that Big Oil had engaged in “campaigns of deception around their products’ contributions to the climate crisis.” Ellison said the ruling confirms that his Minnesota case and others that followed were filed properly in state courts.
Verbatim
Ellison: “Taken together, the defendants’ behavior has delayed the transition to alternative energy sources and a lower carbon economy, resulting in dire impacts on Minnesota’s environment and enormous costs to Minnesotans and the world. Now, the case can move forward in state court, where it was properly filed, and we can begin to hold these companies accountable for their wrongful conduct.”
Ellison. Minnesota attorney general. Elected in 2018. Re-elected 2022. .Earlier a member of Congress elected from Minneapolis. Also deputy chair of Democratic National Committee in 2017 and 2018.
Profile: Minnesota v. Big Oil
Attorney General Keith Ellison sued ExxonMobil, three entities of Koch Industries and the American Petroleum Institute in 2020. He alleged that they had engaged in a 30-year campaign of deception about their role in climate change. The suit cited evidence how these companies strategized to deceive the public about climate-change science in order to safeguard their business interests He noted that experts on climate change inside the companies had issued multiple warnings to corporate leaders about what was coming. Unheeding these internal warnings, the companies mounted “a multi-pronged campaign of public deception” while earning hundreds of billions of dollars in profits while Minnesota shouldered the costs and consequences of unmitigated climate change. The lawsuit includes claims for fraud, failure to warn, and multiple separate violations of state laws that prohibit consumer fraud, deceptive trade practices, and false statements in advertising. The suit demanded restitution, which although unspecified would undoubtedly be in the billions of dollars, for the harms Minnesotans have suffered. The suit also demanded a corrective public education campaign about climate change. The oil companies responded by claiming that state courts were an inappropriate jurisdiction for such suits. This threatened to remove the case from Minnesota state courts to federal courts. However, a Minnesota federal judge, John Tunheim, threw out Big Oil’s jurisdictional claim. Big Oil appealed further in the federal courts and went eventually to U.S. Supreme Court and now has lost. The case now is back in Minnesota state courts and also in the courts of other states that brought similar suits.