Energy giant ExxonMobil filed a lawsuit on Oct. 24 against California officials—including Lauren Sanchez, chair of the California Air Resources Board, and Attorney General Robert A. Bonta—accusing the state’s climate disclosure regulations of harming the company.
The complaint, filed in the District Court for the Eastern District of California, is about two climate laws approved by Gov. Gavin Newsom in October 2023: SB 253 and SB 261.
SB 253 requires businesses with total annual revenues of more than $1 billion that operate in California to disclose their greenhouse gas emissions, while SB 261 requires businesses with more than $500 million in annual revenues operating in the state to develop a report on their climate-related financial risks.
The bills are scheduled to come into effect in 2026.
“Both bills require ExxonMobil to espouse California’s preferred framing for issues of immense public concern,” the company said in its lawsuit.
The bills require the company to “serve as a mouthpiece for ideas with which it disagrees,” it said, while using frameworks that place “disproportionate blame” of emissions and climate risks on companies like ExxonMobil just for “being large.”
Hellbound and Down 