By The American Tribune | Created at 2026-09-02 10:32:47 | Updated at 2026-09-02 11:18:03
1 hour ago
New York Attorney General Letitia James suffered another major courtroom defeat after a federal judge blocked the state’s $75 billion climate superfund law. Chief U.S. District Judge Brenda Sannes ruled Monday that New York cannot force energy companies to pay for worldwide greenhouse gas emissions under the state’s Climate Change Superfund Act. Sannes found that federal law preempts the measure and granted summary judgment to the Republican-led states and energy groups challenging it. The decision stops one of New York’s largest attempts to extract money from fossil fuel producers in the name of climate policy.
The case, State of West Virginia v. James, was brought by a coalition that included 22 states and four industry groups. James was sued in her official capacity alongside officials from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation and the Department of Taxation and Finance. The challengers argued that New York was attempting to impose its own liability system on emissions produced across the United States and throughout the world.
Sannes agreed with the challengers’ central argument. She concluded that the Clean Air Act prevents New York from imposing liability for greenhouse gas emissions originating outside the state. The judge’s decision rejected New York’s claim that the law should survive regardless of which legal standard the court applied.
“In seeking damages ‘for the cumulative impact’ of conduct that has occurred ‘simultaneously across just about every jurisdiction on the planet[,]’ the Climate Act conflicts with ‘the overriding … need for a uniform rule of decision’ on matters influencing national energy and environmental policy, and … ‘basic interests of federalism,’” Sannes wrote, according to the Daily Caller. Her ruling means New York cannot use its climate statute to create what amounts to a state-level payment system for conduct occurring far beyond its borders. The court granted the challengers’ motions for summary judgment, resolving the key preemption dispute in their favor.
New York also argued that its law was protected by the “presumption against preemption,” a legal principle under which courts generally hesitate before finding that federal law has displaced state authority. Sannes rejected that argument in this case. She found that climate disputes involving worldwide emissions raise federal interests that cannot be reconciled with individual states applying their own rules.
The Climate Change Superfund Act required major fossil fuel companies to pay a combined $75 billion over 25 years. Each company’s share was supposed to be calculated using its alleged contribution to greenhouse gas emissions between 2000 and 2018. New York planned to direct the money toward infrastructure and other projects intended to address costs the state attributes to climate change.
The ruling arrives shortly before the Supreme Court is scheduled to hear arguments in Suncor Energy v. County Commissioners of Boulder County. That dispute concerns whether states and local governments may use state law to pursue fossil fuel companies for alleged damage connected to global greenhouse gas emissions. Suncor Energy and ExxonMobil argue that emissions mix throughout the atmosphere and cannot be subjected to separate liability rules created by individual states or municipalities.
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Sannes’ ruling does not decide the Suncor case, but it applies a similar federalism argument to New York’s law. The Daily Caller reported that West Virginia Attorney General JB McCuskey, James, ExxonMobil, Chevron, Peabody Energy, Alpha Metallurgical Resources, Core Natural Resources and Alliance Resource Partners did not immediately respond to requests for comment. James’ office had defended the statute as a lawful effort to recover climate-related costs from large energy producers.
Sannes concluded that disputes over interstate and international emissions “often implicate two federal interests that are incompatible with the application of state law.” She identified those interests as “the overriding need for a uniform rule of decision” concerning national energy and environmental policy and the “basic interests of federalism.”
