As the Justice Department’s environment division has hollowed out its career staff and ramped down enforcement, a small cadre of political lawyers are driving a new priority for the Trump administration — suing states to stop them from acting on climate change.
While it’s not unheard of for the federal government to sue a state, the posture of the Trump administration’s cases is unusual, former staff within DOJ’s Environment and Natural Resources Division say. Federal environmental laws generally set a floor for protection and allow states to take a more stringent approach if they see fit.
“It really is the opposite of what we’ve historically seen,” said Tom Mariani, former head of enforcement at ENRD, who was part of a massive exodus of career staff at the start of the new Trump administration.
Last May, DOJ launched legal challenges against Michigan and Hawaii to stop the states from suing the oil industry to pay up for climate change and against New York and Vermont to block “climate superfund” programs that force firms to pay for spewing greenhouse gas emissions. DOJ has also sued California over fuel economy rules that the Trump administration has said amount to a mandate for electric vehicles.
