April 13, 2018
On Friday, Massachusetts’ top court rejected ExxonMobil’s effort to block Massachusetts State Attorney General Maura Healey from obtaining records to investigate whether the company concealed its knowledge of the role of fossil fuels in climate change.
Carroll Muffett, President of the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL), released the following statement:
Exxon’s loss today in Massachusetts will have implications far beyond that state. In rejecting Exxon’s argument that gas stations—not Exxon itself—are the only ones selling gas in the state, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court demonstrated that Exxon’s standard franchise agreement could expose it to similar investigations across the country. Just as significantly, the Court affirmed the AG’s authority to investigate Exxon’s climate denial under Massachusetts’ consumer protection statutes. More than a dozen other states have nearly identical laws on the books. Far from stemming the tide of climate litigation, Exxon’s arguments in this case have opened the floodgates.