News & Analysis
May 11, 2026
Despite Big Oil’s efforts to bring climate accountability cases to a halt, courts continue to reject the companies’ requests to stay legal proceedings ahead of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Suncor v. Boulder, another climate accountability lawsuit the Court will hear arguments in next term. State judges are also questioning whether a Supreme Court ruling in favor of Big Oil would fully answer the legal questions raised by climate deception cases filed by other communities.
This fall, the High Court will hear arguments on Boulder, Colorado’s climate accountability case against ExxonMobil and Suncor Energy. The case charges the companies with deceiving the public about the climate harms of their fossil fuel products and seeks to make them pay for the climate damages they knowingly caused. Ahead of those arguments, fossil fuel defendants have moved to stay legal proceedings in several of the dozens of climate accountability cases they face brought by communities across the country.
A Hawaiʻi state court judge this week denied ExxonMobil and other oil defendants’ request to stay Honolulu’s case — which survived motions to dismiss and is now in pre-trial discovery — writing that “the eventual outcome of the Boulder appeal is too uncertain to justify a stay that would halt the litigation in this matter.”
“The case was filed six years ago,” Hawaiʻi Judge Lisa Cataldo said. “No one has a glass ball, and past attempts to predict what other courts may do have not been particularly accurate. Accordingly, at this time, the Court believes it prudent to continue to move forward with discovery until, if and when, it is ever clear that discovery in this case will be unnecessary.”
Oregon Judge Adele Ridenour reached a similar conclusion in Multnomah County’s climate case, finding that further delaying the county’s already drawn-out case would cause “potential prejudice” to the county. Judge Ridenour will hear oral arguments on the fossil fuel defendants’ various motions to have the case dismissed later this year.
Both judges found that even if the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the Big Oil companies' favor in Boulder’s case, that ruling may not fully address the issues raised in Honolulu and Multnomah County’s cases.
“Even were the U.S. Supreme Court to issue a decision in Boulder which favors defendants' position, that holding may not fully dispose of all claims in this case,” wrote Judge Ridenour.
Judge Cataldo specified that because lower courts have determined that Honolulu’s case is about deception, not emissions, “it is unclear” whether a ruling from the Supreme Court determining that Boulder’s case is about emissions would “require dismissal of this case.”
A Washington judge also rejected fossil fuel companies’ request to pause the first-ever wrongful death climate case against the oil industry ahead of the Supreme Court arguments. In that ruling, Judge Matthew Lapin also found that it is “speculative” that a ruling from the Supreme Court would resolve all of the issues in the wrongful death case, particularly the oil companies’ failure to warn consumers of the dangers of their products.
”The Court finds that the outcome of the proceedings before the United States Supreme Court is far from certain,” Judge Lapin wrote. “There are too many variables for this Court to find that the Supreme Court will issue a substantive ruling.”
Big Oil’s requests to stay proceedings in climate cases filed by Hawaiʻi, the Shoalwater Bay Indian Tribe, and Makah Indian Tribe have also been denied by their respective courts.
As climate accountability cases continue to move through the courts, Big Oil companies are seeking a legal liability shield from Congress. Republican lawmakers have introduced federal bills that aim to block any laws or lawsuits against the fossil fuel industry over its role in the climate crisis. If passed, the bills would essentially place Big Oil above the law.
