The coordinated litigation strategies and actions of Republican state attorneys general in defense of fossil fuel and other industries stem from an organization called the Republican Attorneys General Association (RAGA), which Graves said was created in the wake of the tobacco industry being held accountable through the 1998 Master Settlement Agreement.
The organization, which currently lists 29 Republican state attorneys general as members, has been funded through donations from conservative judicial activists like Leonard Leo as well as from corporate interests including those in the fossil fuel industry. The American Petroleum Institute gave over $125,000 to RAGA in 2024, and in the first six months of this year Chevron’s Policy, Government and Public Affairs division donated $25,000 to the organization, for example.
Graves describes RAGA as a “pay-to-play organization.”
“It has a pay sheet listing what kind of access you get to attorneys general based on how much you give,” she told Inside Climate News.
“These attorneys general use the prestige of their office and their power and the resources that their taxpayers are providing to serve the interests of industry, select industries that they are most tied to, and that certainly includes the fossil fuel industry,” Graves added.
The Republican Attorneys General Association did not respond to a request for comment.
“A perilous moment”
The intensifying backlash to climate accountability efforts coming from the fossil fuel industry and its political defenders is happening at a time when some political scholars warn that the US is sliding into some form of authoritarianism, which advocates say magnifies the challenges of holding powerful interests to account writ large.
“It’s a perilous moment for democratic norms and institutions,” said Kathy Mulvey, accountability campaign director for the climate and energy program at the Union of Concerned Scientists.
“Anybody who is pursuing policy change or litigation for accountability or enforcement is counting on the courts to be a real backstop for democratic institutions,” Mulvey told Inside Climate News.
Should the fossil fuel industry somehow succeed in securing legal immunity, Wiles said it “would be consistent with the erosion of the rule of law that we’re seeing.”
“No industry should be above the law,” he added.
This article originally appeared on Inside Climate News, a nonprofit, non-partisan news organization that covers climate, energy, and the environment. Sign up for their newsletter here.
