OPINION:
When voters reject extreme environmental policy, the climate left does not take no for an answer. It just changes the venue.
Instead of persuading voters or winning legislative debates, activists recruit state attorneys general to turn courtrooms into unelected climate legislatures.
Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel’s lawsuit against energy producers is the latest example of this climate lawfare, and Michigan lawmakers have now delivered the right response.
The state’s bipartisan fiscal year 2027 budget requires a separate appropriation or legislative transfer before the attorney general’s office can use state funds to participate in multistate litigation, sue the federal government or sue an oil or natural gas company.
In other words, the legislature is tired of Ms. Nessel using her office’s powers to pursue political stunts.
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat, signed the budget into law on July 21. That is a victory for taxpayers, affordable energy and representative government.
Ms. Nessel filed her lawsuit against the energy industry in January. After initially exploring a climate deception case, her office pursued a novel antitrust theory, accusing the companies of operating as a “cartel” to suppress competition from renewable energy and electric vehicles.
This is not a conventional antitrust case about competitors conspiring to fix a product’s price. It is an attempt to use the courts to manage America’s energy mix, punish sensible business decisions and force an energy transition that voters never approved.
Ms. Nessel’s office says the outside firms handling the case are working on contingency and will receive no state payment unless they recover money. Still, that does not make the exercise of state power free or democratically accountable.
The lawsuit is being brought in Michigan’s name, backed by the state’s authority and institutional resources. It could affect energy policy and prices far beyond Michigan.
If it succeeds, private law firms stand to collect a portion of the recovery while helping shape public policy through litigation. The legislature has every right to demand a say before public resources and state authority are used for such a sweeping political project.
The practical stakes are real. Michigan families still heat their homes with natural gas. Michigan workers still drive gasoline-powered cars and trucks. Michigan farmers, manufacturers and small businesses depend on reliable, affordable petroleum products every day.
Punishing the companies that produce and deliver those fuels will not make energy cheaper. It will create more legal costs, uncertainty and obstacles to investment, and those costs will eventually land on workers, customers and taxpayers.
This is the climate left’s familiar playbook: Attack energy producers, make conventional energy more expensive and then blame the companies when consumers’ bills go up.
Michigan lawmakers were right to interrupt that cycle. Other states should follow their lead.
Legislatures should require explicit public approval before taxpayer dollars are used to finance lawsuits designed to reshape national energy policy. They should require full disclosure of outside legal assistance and prohibit private organizations from placing privately funded lawyers inside government offices to wield state enforcement power.
This is not the first time legislators have recognized the need for stronger guardrails. Virginia lawmakers acted in 2019 after controversy erupted over privately funded environmental lawyers working inside the attorney general’s office. Wisconsin lawmakers have examined the same issue through their Department of Justice’s use of special assistant attorneys general paid by outside organizations.
The arrangements differ, but the principle is the same. Lawyers exercising state power should answer to the public, not private donors or activist groups with an agenda.
Michigan’s reform addresses the other side of that accountability gap. It asks not only who pays the government’s attorneys but also whether taxpayer funds should support politically consequential litigation without explicit legislative approval.
Public officials should be paid by the public, be accountable to the public and be subject to the public’s elected representatives.
For too long, climate activists have treated state attorneys general as an end run around democracy. When activists cannot advance their agenda through lawmaking, they look for a “sympathetic attorney general.”
Michigan lawmakers finally said enough. They used the power of the purse to put climate lawfare on a short leash. Every state legislature concerned about affordable energy, taxpayer accountability and the abuse of public power should do the same.
• Thomas J. Pyle is president of the American Energy Alliance.
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