Which, obviously, would lead to Democrats whining about the right leaning court which dares to follow the law and the Constitution, rather than their own feelings
The Supreme Court seemed to signal interest this week in taking up a challenge launched by Hawaii against big oil companies to hold them liable for climate change, and some Democrats are suggesting the high court is “captured” for the fossil fuel industry.
The Supreme Court on Monday asked the Justice Department to weigh in on a petition to hear a lawsuit brought by the City of Honolulu against major fuel companies including Sunoco, Exxon and Chevron, claiming the companies’ products cause greenhouse gas emissions and global warming without warning consumers about the risks.
The city employed a series of state laws like public nuisance and trespass measures and said the companies should pay billions to the state to abate the effects of climate change like weather events, sea level rise, heat waves, flooding and global warming generally.
Will any of the justices ask if the state of Hawaii has given up their own use of fossil fuels? It wouldn’t survive as with all the planes, boats, cars, and helicopters bringing in and ferrying around all the tourists, not too mention bringing all the goods and food. Did the state government stop using them?
The high court gave DOJ no deadline for the solicitor general’s input, but its request indicates a high likelihood the court wants to hear the case. (snip)
But some Democrats and liberal advocates have begun preemptively criticizing the court.
Last week, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., who sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee, posted on X saying, “[t]his captured Court’s delays of and interference in fossil fuel emissions regulations have already saved the polluters hundreds of billions — way more than they spent to capture it. But there is no end to fossil fuel polluters’ greed and entitlement.”
Lisa Graves, the executive director at the left-wing watchdog group True North Research, told the Rolling Stone that fossil fuel companies’ “efforts to evade legal accountability are being aided by… the very same groups that helped the majority of justices on the U.S. Supreme Court get their seats on the bench.”
In fairness, these same people and groups constantly whine about SCOTUS and fossil fuels companies, they are just trying to link them now. But, weirdly, none of them mention having given up their own use of fossil fuels. How many times a year does Sheldon fly to and from Rhode Island to D.C.? He could easily take the train.
But Fox News Digital has previously reported that the Hawaii litigation has been pushed by liberal dark money groups and legal partners.Hawaii Supreme Court Chief Justice Mark Recktenwald, in his opinion rejecting the energy companies’ arguments, wrote, “Defendants knew of the dangers of using their fossil fuel products, ‘knowingly concealed and misrepresented the climate impacts of their fossil fuel products,’ and engaged in ‘sophisticated disinformation campaigns to cast doubt on the science, causes, and effects of global warming,’ causing increased fossil fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions, which then caused property and infrastructure damage in Honolulu.”
I still fail to understand why the sued companies do not simply stop operating in Hawaii, or at least stop selling to the government.
Read: Liberals Concerned SCOTUS May Take Up ‘Climate Change’ Case »