NY Attorney General sues to uphold national emissions rules

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New York Attorney General Letitia James and a coalition of 40 states, counties, cities, and state agencies sued on Thursday to stop the federal government from erasing climate change regulations. James wants to overturn the Environmental Protection Agency’s repeal of the 2009 endangerment finding.

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James filed the petition in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit alongside Massachusetts, California, and Connecticut. They asked the court to reinstate the endangerment finding and throw out the emissions repeal. The lawsuit argued that the rollback ignored science, dismissed evidence, and violated the Clean Air Act.

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Reached for comment on Friday, the EPA dismissed the lawsuit as partisan posturing, accusing the coalition of running to the press before formally filing it. “It illustrates that for them, this is not about the law or the merits of any argument,” a spokesperson for the agency said. “They are clearly motivated by politics.”

The EPA maintained that they reviewed recent SCOTUS decisions—specifically “West Virginia v. EPA” and “Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo”—to make the case that the agency has no power under Section 202 of the Clean Air Act to regulate motor vehicle emissions to fight climate change. “In the absence of such authority, the Endangerment Finding is not valid, and EPA cannot retain the regulations that resulted from it,” the agency stated. “Congress never intended to give EPA authority to impose [greenhouse gas] regulations for cars and trucks.”

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