Monday morning, climate activists are rallying at the Supreme Court in support of communities demanding accountability for Big Oil’s climate lies and the rising wave of destruction they’ve created.

If you’re in D.C., join the people at 9 am sharp:

The court—minus Sammy Alito—is hearing arguments in Suncor v. Boulder, the oil industry’s attempt to kill every one of the dozens of local climate lawsuits filed across the nation from Multnomah County, Oregon to Puerto Rico.¹ The industry argument is that federal law precludes state relief from climate pollution damages. This is the latest round in the ongoing game that nobody but nobody is allowed to save humanity from climate destruction by carbon profiteers.

Alito recused himself last week because he is a huge investor in oil giants who publicly warned these lawsuits “could increase our costs or otherwise adversely affect our business” (Phillips 66) and “may limit who can do business with us or our access to financial markets and could subject us to litigation” and thus materially and adversely affect “our business, operating results and financial condition, as well as the value of an investment in our common stock” (ConocoPhillips).

Alito almost definitely knows the other five Trumpian justices plan to rule in Big Oil’s favor. They include Amy Coney Barrett, whose father is a longtime Shell Oil lawyer, Clarence Thomas, whose many billionaire benefactors include Tony Novelly, the CEO of the privately held Apex Oil, and Neil Gorsuch, whose mother was an anti-environment EPA administrator for Ronald Reagan and who he himself was attorney for oil tycoon Phil Anschutz for several years. Gorsuch remains a regular guest at Anschutz’s dude ranch in eastern Colorado.

In September 2013, Boulder County, Colorado was devastated by catastrophic flooding after record-shattering rainfall.

In April 2018, the county filed suit against oil giants ExxonMobil and Suncor for damages that include “increasing wildfire risk” by their decades-long strategy of preventing climate action through misinformation and political influence campaigns.

The oil companies have been able to delay the case from even getting to court for more than eight years, during which time Boulder has been struck time and again by new climate disasters.

The oil criminals’ first gambit was to try to move the case to federal court; a year later in 2019, the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado rejected them, sending it back to state court. They asked an emergency overruling, rejected by Justice Sonia Sotomayor in her role as the justice assigned to “ride” the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals. (Brett Kavanaugh, who was appointed to the Supreme Court in October 2018, indicated he would have granted the petition.) They then appealed, which was ejected another year later, in 2020, by the tenth circuit.

In October 2020, the Cal-Wood Fire burned over 10,000 acres in Boulder County, destroying 26 homes.

In May 2021, the Supreme Court handed industry a major victory in another climate lawsuit, Baltimore v. BP, expanding the grounds by which companies like the oil majors can engage in forum shopping to avoid state courts, but did not conclusively rule that federal laws preëmpt local climate suits. In line with that decision, the Supremes vacated the tenth circuit ruling, forcing them to consider the case yet again under their new Baltimore v. BP standards.

In December 2021, Boulder County was struck by the Marshall Fire, a horrific firestorm described thusly by Nathan Schneider:

In 2022, the tenth circuit tossed, for the second time, the effort by ExxonMobil and Suncor looking to keep the Boulder climate liability case in federal court. The oil companies, of course, appealed to the Supreme Court again.

In 2023, the Biden Department of Justice belatedly supported Boulder’s suit with a brief submitted by Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar. This time the Supremes accepted the tenth circuit’s ruling, sending the case finally to begin in local court… sorta.

The petrochemical polluters appeal the Colorado District Court’s procedural ruling in 2024 denying their motion to dismiss on the grounds of federal preëmption. The case bounces back up to the Colorado Supreme Court!

Boosted by the oil industry, Trump is reëlected in November 2024.

In May 2025, the Colorado State Supreme Court rules, yet again, against the Big Oil bastards. They then appealed that decision to the Supreme Court of the United States, which accepted it in February 2026 as the formal vehicle by which to kill these local climate suits once and for all.

After the record heat and lack of snowfall of the 2025 winter and 2026 spring, Boulder has been in an official drought watch throughout 2026.

Climate Action Monday:

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