In a first for climate accountability lawsuits, Hoboken, New Jersey, is charging fossil fuel companies with violating state racketeering laws.
The U.S. Supreme Court rejected Big Oil once again on Monday by allowing two more climate accountability lawsuits — from Delaware and Hoboken, New Jersey — to continue moving toward trial in state courts.
Delaware, the lowest-lying state in the nation, and Hoboken, which sits on the Hudson River across from New York City, each filed lawsuits against Exxon, Chevron, Shell, BP, and other oil majors, as well as the American Petroleum Institute (API), in 2020 to hold them accountable under local consumer fraud laws and make them pay for the rising costs to protect residents from flooding, superstorms, and other climate damages.
But now, Hoboken’s case also charges the polluters with violating New Jersey’s Racketeering Influenced Corrupt Organizations Act, better known as RICO.