FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 3, 2026
CONTACT:
Aaron Bharucha, Public Relations Associate
(509) 429-1699 and epn-press@environmentalprotectionnetwork.org
Former EPA Leaders Tell Supreme Court: Clean Air Act Does Not Preempt Boulder Climate Case
Brief from former Administrators William Reilly and Gina McCarthy, 18 other former EPA officials and career staff, and EPN supports Boulder County and the City of Boulder
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Former EPA Administrators William Reilly and Gina McCarthy, 18 other former EPA senior officials, attorneys, and career staff, and the Environmental Protection Network (EPN) today filed a friend-of-the-court brief with the U.S. Supreme Court in Suncor Energy (U.S.A.) Inc., et al. v. County Commissioners of Boulder County, et al. The brief supports Boulder County and the City of Boulder, which are seeking damages under state law for climate-related harms, alleging that the companies misled the public and engaged in other wrongful conduct in promoting and selling fossil-fuel products.
Drawing on decades of experience administering the Clean Air Act, the amici explain that nothing in the Act’s text or structure preempts Boulder’s deceptive-advertising and consumer-protection claims. The Clean Air Act regulates air emissions. It has never been applied or construed as regulating the broader fields of truthful advertising or consumer protection.
Boulder’s claims seek monetary damages, not emissions controls. They would not override any Clean Air Act permit, impose emissions limits on sources in other states, or interfere with EPA’s administration of the Act. Even if the litigation indirectly led to lower greenhouse gas emissions, that would be consistent with the Act’s purposes of reducing air pollution and protecting public health and welfare. It would also be consistent with Congress’s explicit recognition that states generally may adopt more stringent emissions limits than those set by EPA.
Drawing on their experience administering the Act, the former EPA officials also told the Court that they are unaware of any EPA regulation under the Clean Air Act that has turned on a regulated company’s potential liability under an unrelated area of law.
“Congress carefully defined EPA’s authority under the Clean Air Act,” said William Reilly, who served as EPA Administrator from 1989 to 1993. “The law regulates emissions, not fossil-fuel marketing, and it does not displace states’ traditional authority to apply their own tort law to conduct outside its scope. The Court should not create an immunity Congress never enacted.”
“Oil companies are asking the Court to turn the Clean Air Act on its head,” said Gina McCarthy, who served as EPA Administrator from 2013 to 2017. “It was written to reduce pollution and protect public health, not to shield fossil-fuel companies from state-law claims. Boulder is seeking damages for alleged misconduct, not emissions limits, and it should be allowed to make its case.”
The brief urges the Supreme Court to affirm the Colorado Supreme Court’s judgment allowing Boulder’s state-law claims to proceed.
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About the Environmental Protection Network
The Environmental Protection Network is a nonpartisan organization comprising more than 800 former EPA scientists, toxicologists, chemists, biologists, engineers, and policy analysts — many of whom spent decades as career experts inside the agency. They assessed cancer and developmental risks, studied links between pollution and fertility and chronic disease, investigated contaminated communities, and brought enforcement actions to hold corporate polluters accountable. EPN was founded in 2017 to serve as an independent voice promoting science-based policies that protect families’ health.
The Individual Amici
The 20 individual amici are a nonpartisan group of former EPA senior leaders, attorneys, and career staff with deep expertise in administering the Clean Air Act. In addition to former Administrators William Reilly and Gina McCarthy, they include former Deputy Administrators, Assistant Administrators responsible for EPA’s air program, General Counsels, senior executives, and career attorneys.