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For Immediate Release
May, 02 2018, 12:00am EDT
Contact:
Dani Heffernan, dani@350.org, +1 (305) 992-1544
350.org on 17 States' Lawsuit Against Trump Administration's Clean Car Rollbacks
Today, 17 states including California filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration for it's plans to rollback clean car standards, citing the administration's Clean Air Act violations. 350.org Executive Director May Boeve gave the following response:
Oakland, CA
Today, 17 states including California filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration for it's plans to rollback clean car standards, citing the administration's Clean Air Act violations. 350.org Executive Director May Boeve gave the following response:
"This lawsuit is yet another example of states, cities and communities stepping up where the Trump administration is failing. In the lead-up to California's Global Climate Action Summit, it's critical that public officials at all levels challenge Trump's climate-denying agenda and commit to moving us toward a fossil free world. We need real climate action that stops all new fossil fuel projects--like pipelines--and transitions cities and states to 100% renewable energy."
In September, Gov. Jerry Brown will welcome world leaders to San Francisco for his Global Climate Action Summit. Already, communities in California, across the country and around the globe, are preparing to mobilize for the Summit and put pressure on the world's public officials to commit to a just transition to 100% renewable energy and to a ban on new fossil fuel projects. Last month, that pressure was focused on Gov. Brown, when nearly 800 organizations sent a letter to his office, urging him to take action against fossil fuel extraction in the Golden State.
On May 14th, in the lead-up to the summit, climate and environmental movement leaders will hold a discussion on how California can become a global model for the fast and just transition away from fossil fuels to a 100% renewable energy economy. Panelists will discuss the steps already underway and the work that remains to build a fossil free California that supports communities and the climate. This "Real Climate Leadership" panel coincides with community-led events being held at city halls around the country calling for public officials to support resolutions that ban new fossil fuel projects and jumpstart transitions to renewable energy.
More information on the "Real Climate Leadership" panel can be found below and at the following link: https://350.org/may14/
WHAT: "Real Climate Leadership: How California Can Keep Fossil Fuels in the Ground, and build a Just Transition to 100% Renewable Energy", a panel discussion.
WHEN:Monday, May 14, 2018 at 7PM PDT.
WHERE: The Scottish Rite Center, 1547 Lakeside Drive, Oakland, CA 94612
WHO:
Moderator:
- Antonia Juhasz (author, investigative journalist)
Panelists:
- Bill McKibben (author, co-founder of 350.org)
- Pennie Opal Plant (Idle No More SF Bay)
- Juan Flores (Center on Race, Poverty, & the Environment)
WHY: Between record-breaking wildfires and on-going droughts, Californians have experienced the impacts of the climate crisis firsthand. At the same time, the fossil fuel industry that's driving the crisis forward is a dangerous and imposing presence across the state, from neighborhood drilling in South Los Angeles, to fracking in the Central Valley, and oil refineries dotting the coastline.
So far, California policy has only addressed the demand for energy, while avoiding measures to curb fossil fuel extraction. As Gov. Brown prepares to hold the Global Climate Action Summit during his final term in office, the Golden State is uniquely positioned to take precedent-setting action against the fossil fuel industry.
Panel Co-sponsored by: Idle No More SF Bay, 350.org, Oil Change International, Center on Race, Poverty & the Environment, CultureStrike, Amazon Watch, Greenpeace U.S., Center for Biological Diversity, Stand.earth, SustainUS, Rock the Bike, Diablo Rising Tide, Californians Against Fracking, Rootskeeper, Friends of the Earth, Conscious Elders Network/Elder Activists Social Justice Team, Food & Water Watch, Sunflower Alliance, Fossil Free California, 350 Bay Area, The Sanders Institute, ClimateTruth.org and more.
350 is building a future that's just, prosperous, equitable and safe from the effects of the climate crisis. We're an international movement of ordinary people working to end the age of fossil fuels and build a world of community-led renewable energy for all.
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Four wealthy nations—the United States, Canada, Norway, and Australia—account for the majority of planned oil and gas expansion over the next decade, according to new data published by Oil Change International on Monday, the first day of the Bonn Climate Change Conference in Germany.
Oil Change's analysis, titled Planet Wreckers, notes that if those four Global North nations stopped their planned new oil and gas extraction, 32 billion tons of carbon pollution would stay in the ground instead of being burned and released into the atmosphere, where they fuel planetary heating. That's the equivalent of three times the annual global emissions created by burning coal.
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"It is sickening that countries with the highest incomes and outsized historical responsibility for causing the climate crisis are planning massive oil and gas expansion with no regard for the lives and livelihoods at stake," Ioualalen added.
(Image: Oil Change International)
Nations that took part in the 2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference, or COP28, in Dubai committed to an equitable transition from fossil fuels. However, as Ioualalen noted, "this commitment is largely being ignored by some of the world's richest countries."
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"There has never been a more urgent time for the ABA to defend its members, our profession and the rule of law itself," said the group's president.
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The American Bar Association sued U.S. President Donald Trump's administration in a Washington, D.C. federal court on Monday over what the ABA called his "law firm intimidation policy."
"Since taking office earlier this year, President Trump has used the vast powers of the executive branch to coerce lawyers and law firms to abandon clients, causes, and policy positions the president does not like," states the ABA complaint, which names various entities and leaders in the administration as defendants.
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Trump's administration has also relied on "other related executive orders, letters, and memoranda," and "public statements by the president and his administration publicizing the objectives of the law firm intimidation policy," the complaint details. "The president's attacks on law firms through the faw firm orders are thus not isolated events, but one component of a broader, deliberate policy designed to intimidate and coerce law firms and lawyers to refrain from challenging the president or his administration in court, or from even speaking publicly in support of policies or causes that the president does not like."
The filing stresses that "without skilled lawyers to bring and argue cases—and to do so by advancing the interests of their clients without fear of reprisal from the government—the judiciary cannot function as a meaningful check on executive overreach."
Some firms are already fighting back against Trump's attacks, which the ABA called "unprecedented and uniquely dangerous to the rule of law." As Bloombergdetailed Monday:
Three firms hit with executive orders—Perkins Coie, Jenner & Block, and WilmerHale—later obtained permanent injunctions against the executive orders, with judges striking them down as unconstitutional. Susman has obtained a temporary injunction and is awaiting a ruling on a request for a final decision.
Nine other firms have pledged a total of nearly $1 billion in free legal services as part of deals to avoid similar orders. They committed to working on causes championed by Trump, including combating antisemitism, assisting veterans, and ensuring fairness" in the justice system.
After powerhouse firm Paul Weiss struck a deal with Trump, eight others—A&O Shearman, Cadwalader, Kirkland & Ellis, Latham & Watkins, Milbank, Simpson Thacher, Skadden Arps, and Wilkie Farr—followed suit. The firms have faced intense criticism for the agreements.
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The complaint also highlights other impacts, including that "many attorneys are no longer willing to take on representations that would require suing the federal government," and "others have dropped ongoing representations; ended their participation in
contemplated cases; or declined representations—even of clients with whom they had longstanding prior attorney-client relationships—not because the merits of the case were weak or the attorney had some substantive objection to taking the case, but because the representation was deemed too likely to result in severe retaliation from the president."
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