The Trump administration is urging a federal judge to hear its lawsuit that seeks to block Michigan from joining a host of states suing the oil and gas industry over climate change.
Deferring review of the government’s case “would inflict hardship on the United States,” the Department of Justice said in a brief filed Monday in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Michigan.
The motion comes after Michigan in June asked to dismiss a Trump administration lawsuit seeking to block the Great Lakes State from joining other Democratic-led states in suing the fossil fuel industry over the costs of rising tides and other climate change effects.
DOJ has argued that the more than two dozen climate liability cases filed by states, counties and cities across the nation complicate foreign policy. Forcing the United States “to stand by and wait to defend its sovereign interest in controlling foreign affairs would impose a clear hardship on its diplomatic efforts,” government lawyers have argued.
