By Jack Queen
(Reuters) -A federal judge in Montana on Wednesday threw out a lawsuit by youth activists seeking to block U.S. President Donald Trump’s pro-fossil fuel energy policies, saying it asked the court to take on a sweeping role overseeing potentially hundreds of government rules and regulations.
A group of young people represented by the nonprofit Our Children’s Trust sued in May, arguing Trump’s executive orders aimed at “unleashing” American energy were unconstitutional. Their lawyers said they would appeal Wednesday’s ruling.
U.S. District Judge Dana L. Christensen said in an order that while the activists had shown they would be harmed by Trump’s policies, they asked him to assume a sweeping role in climate regulation that would overstep his powers as a judge.
“This court would be required to monitor an untold number of federal agency actions to determine whether they contravene its injunction. This is, quite simply, an unworkable request for which plaintiffs provide no precedent,” Christensen said.
Our Children’s Trust chief legal counsel Julia Olson said in a statement that Trump’s energy policies are causing irreparable harm to the health, safety and future of the 22 young people who brought the case.
“We will appeal — because courts cannot offer more protection to fossil fuel companies seeking to preserve their profits than to young Americans seeking to preserve their right,” Olson said.
Adam Gustafson of the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division praised the ruling in a statement on Wednesday, saying the lawsuit was a baseless attack on Trump’s energy agenda.
Trump, a Republican, unveiled executive orders in January aimed at maximizing oil and gas production, rolling back environmental protections and withdrawing the U.S. from an international pact to fight climate change.
The United Nations has said scientific evidence clearly shows greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuels are responsible for rising temperatures and destructive changes to earth’s climate.
In their lawsuit, the activists said Trump’s policies would cause them a litany of harms, including life-threatening health conditions stemming from rising temperatures, air pollution from wildfires and flooding from increasingly powerful storms.
They asked the court to declare Trump’s orders illegal, block their implementation and roll back all policy changes stemming from them.
The Trump administration said the activists had no right to dictate climate policy through litigation and should instead seek redress through the political process.
“A self-designated group of children and young plaintiffs claim they are better positioned to set national energy policy than the President of the United States,” U.S. Department of Justice lawyers said in a court filing.
(Reporting by Jack Queen in New York; Additional reporting by Luc Cohen; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama, Rod Nickel and Aurora Ellis)
