Republican-led states are embracing a new way to shield the oil and gas industry from climate lawsuits — by curtailing a widely used law that activists and government officials have deployed in the past to bolster lawsuits against polluters, opioid manufacturers, social media companies and the cigarette industry.
Montana, Kansas and Utah have passed legislation in the past year that narrows their public nuisance laws. Similar bills were introduced in recent years in Indiana and Texas — and more could follow after the conservative American Legislative Exchange Council earlier this month approved model legislation along similar lines.
The trend has alarmed trial lawyers and environmental groups who say the effort could weaken efforts to hold polluters accountable for damages and make it harder to challenge massive projects, such as data centers.
“You’re cutting off any type of remedy for folks,” Al Smith, executive director of the Montana Trial Lawyers Association, told lawmakers in Helena last year before the state legislature passed new restrictions on the state’s public nuisance law.
