Climate Lawfare EXPOSED — What’s Really Going On

A person in a gas mask pulling back a curtain revealing a polluted cityscape

Climate activists are using the courts to punish America’s energy sector with backdoor taxes and endless litigation, driving up prices for every family while sidestepping our constitutional safeguards.

Story Snapshot

Climate litigation is being weaponized as a de facto carbon tax on American consumers, not to achieve real legal remedies.
Most lawsuits against oil and gas companies have failed in court, but the financial damage persists through legal costs and uncertainty.
Environmental NGOs, law firms, and local governments coordinate to bypass legislative processes and exert pressure on the energy industry.
This strategy threatens affordable domestic energy, job growth, and sets a dangerous precedent for activist-driven lawfare.

Litigation as a Backdoor Carbon Tax: The True Aim Exposed

Veteran energy analyst David Blackmon has revealed that the wave of climate-related lawsuits targeting U.S. oil and gas companies is not about seeking true justice or environmental remediation. Instead, these cases are designed to impose a de facto carbon tax through relentless legal costs and settlements. By flooding the courts with lawsuits—even in the face of repeated dismissals—activists create a financial drag on the energy sector, with higher costs inevitably passed on to American families. This strategy represents an assault on market freedom and an attempt to enact radical climate policies without the consent of Congress.

Climate lawfare, as described by Blackmon, is a coordinated effort involving NGOs, plaintiff law firms, and local governments. After failing to push carbon taxes and strict regulations through the legislative process, activists turned to state and local courts to sue energy producers under consumer protection and nuisance laws. Supreme Court decisions have reinforced that only the federal government may regulate air emissions, prompting lawfare groups to seek creative legal workarounds. The intent is clear: to inflict enough financial pain to alter industry behavior, regardless of whether these cases ever succeed on the merits.

Who’s Behind the Climate Lawfare Campaign?

Key players in this campaign include specialized plaintiff law firms, environmental NGOs, and local government partners eager to project moral authority while risking little themselves. Firms like Share Edling operate on contingency, minimizing local exposure while maximizing the pressure on targets like ExxonMobil and Chevron. Admissions by prominent litigators, such as David Bookbinder, make it plain that the process itself is punitive—a substitute for a carbon tax that could never pass Congress. This coordination undermines the traditional balance of powers, allowing activist agendas to drive up energy costs and undercut the economic security of everyday Americans.

Despite their efforts, the majority of these lawsuits have failed to win damages or establish legal liability. However, the ongoing litigation imposes significant legal expenses and uncertainty on the energy sector. Dismissals in key cases—Baltimore, Maryland, New Jersey—demonstrate the lack of legal merit, yet the strategy persists, fueled by the activist goal of financial punishment rather than justice. This approach threatens to normalize lawfare tactics, risking broader impacts across other industries and eroding constitutional protections for private enterprise.

Economic and Social Consequences for American Families

The most immediate victims of this activist-driven lawfare are American workers and families who depend on reliable, affordable energy. Legal costs and compliance burdens are passed on through higher fuel and utility bills, straining household budgets and threatening jobs in the energy sector. The long-term implications are even more dire: if these tactics succeed, they will chill investment in domestic energy production, shrink job opportunities, and hand policy power to unelected special interests. The result is a stealth tax on energy, imposed not by lawmakers, but by coordinated activist lawsuits that bypass democratic accountability.

“Tort liability is an indirect carbon tax,” says lawfare attorney David Bookbinder in my new piece at the @DailyCaller.

Oh.

DAVID BLACKMON: Attorney Exposes Real Goal Of Climate Lawfare Movement https://t.co/yKynzqxJRz via @dailycaller

— David Blackmon's Energy Absurdity (@EnergyAbsurdity) October 22, 2025

This campaign also deepens polarization, diverting attention and resources from genuine solutions and fueling public distrust. While some defenders argue that such litigation is necessary for climate justice, the evidence shows that the main achievement so far has been economic harm and legal chaos, not meaningful environmental progress. For conservatives and all Americans committed to constitutional order, energy security, and economic growth, the climate lawfare movement represents a clear threat to our way of life and our freedoms.