Attorney General Aaron Frey made Maine the ninth state to file a “climate deception” lawsuit against oil giants Tuesday, alleging that they chose profits over following early science that showed likely irreversible climate effects from fossil fuels.
The Democratic attorney general filed the lawsuit in a state court. The Maine filing uses language that is directly taken from similar ones made by other states, cities and other entities across the country as part of an international movement to sue oil, gas and coal firms.
The targets of the Maine lawsuit are the oil giants Exxon, Shell, Chevron, BP and Sunoco as well as the American Petroleum Institute, the industry’s major trade group. Frey cites findings that oil companies knew as early as the 1960s that burning fossil fuels could change the climate but tamped down that science while misleading the public.
“For over half a century, these companies chose to fuel profits instead of following their own science to prevent what are now likely irreversible, catastrophic climate effects,” Frey said in a statement.
Maine is asking the state court system to force the companies to pay for past damage due to climate changes as well as future damages. No oil or gas company has ever been ordered to pay these kinds of damages, according to a September report by Oil Change International that couches the legal strategy as chiefly looking to dissuade investment in the fossil-fuel sector.
Many of these lawsuits are still going through U.S. courts, but some have failed to pass early hurdles. A federal appeals court in 2021 dismissed a similar case from New York City. Earlier this year, a local court dismissed a Baltimore case. A Delaware court limited the scope of a state lawsuit this year, saying it could only focus on in-state pollution sources.
Some of the parties targeted by Frey issued sharp responses to the Maine lawsuit on Tuesday. Chevron called it meritless through a spokesperson for a lawyer representing the company.
“This ongoing, coordinated campaign to wage meritless, politicized lawsuits against a foundational American industry and its workers is nothing more than a distraction from important national conversations and an enormous waste of taxpayer resources,” Ryan Meyers, a senior vice president for the American Petroleum Institute, said in a statement.
Frey teased his move in a letter to Democratic lawmakers earlier this month in support of his bid to keep his job. He is being opposed for the party’s nomination by Maeghan Maloney, the district attorney in Kennebec and Somerset counties. The party will pick a nominee next Tuesday, and the Democratic-led Legislature will take a unified vote to make a final choice the next day.