What Our Trump Lawsuits Are All About

The Trump administration is trying to take the country back to an era when cities were choking on smog and rivers caught on fire. We fought hard to get where we are today. Earthjustice’s hard-hitting litigation over the past 50 years has protected countless wildlife and wild places, shut down fossil fuels and made way for clean energy, and successfully reduced toxic chemical pollution in our homes and lives.

Now, Earthjustice’s lawyers are going to court to keep moving us forward.

Our 200+ attorneys have filed some of the first major environmental lawsuits against the administration, and we’ve never been stronger or more prepared to continue making progress on today’s most pressing challenges, including:

A controlled burn of oil from the Deepwater Horizon/BP oil spill sends towers of fire hundreds of feet into the air over the Gulf of Mexico on June 9, 2010. The Trump administration wants to allow more drilling in the Gulf. (Petty Officer First Class John Masson / US Coast Guard)

Protecting Our Oceans From Oil and Gas Drilling

The problem: Offshore oil drilling harms marine life and risks catastrophic oil spills in U.S. waters. One spill, the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster, cost the fishing industry an estimated $1 billion in lost revenue, decimated Gulf Coast tourism, killed untold millions of marine wildlife, and sickened thousands of people.

The solution: Earthjustice has long worked to oppose offshore drilling and recently secured a legal victory on behalf of clients in a lawsuit challenging a massive oil sale in the Gulf of Mexico. Additionally, President Biden protected ocean waters off several major U.S. coastlines against oil development. With this act, Biden echoed the overwhelming public support to protect our most sensitive ocean territories from dangerous drilling.

Trump’s actions: President Trump has vowed to increase drilling in our public waters, even though the U.S. is already producing more oil than any other nation. In one of his first executive actions, Trump issued an order to revoke Biden’s protection of undeveloped public waters from future oil and gas drilling. His actions pose significant threats to coastal communities across the U.S, as well as to the millions of people who rely on clean and healthy oceans.

Our response:
We’ve been here before. During the first Trump administration, Earthjustice successfully stopped its attempts to gut offshore oil drilling protections. We’ve also had decades of litigation success against dangerous plans for oil drilling, most recently in March 2025, and we’ll do it again with our current lawsuit against Trump’s illegal order.

Waldorf & Sons excavating crew foreman Brian Damon unhooks a lead service line on March 3, 2016, in Flint, Mich. (Jake May / The Flint Journal-MLive.com via AP)

Removing Toxic Lead From Our Lives

The problem: Despite decades of progress removing toxic lead from our air, drinking water, and soil, as many as 22 million people still drink water from lead pipes. Multiple cities, from Flint, Michigan, to Buffalo, New York, have suffered major lead contamination crises. We know that lead can permanently damage our bodies, and it’s especially dangerous to children.
The solution: After years of advocacy by Earthjustice and our partners, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued a widely popular rule in 2024 requiring that almost all lead pipes in the U.S. be replaced within a decade. The Biden administration also set aside billions of dollars to help pay for lead pipe replacement, which will help address the more than 9 million lead service lines buried nationwide.
Trump’s actions: President Trump has ordered the EPA to block hundreds of millions in federal funding to states for lead pipe replacement. Some in Congress are also attempting to undo the EPA rule on lead pipes.
Our response: Earthjustice is mobilizing to prevent Congress from gutting the EPA rule. Here’s how you can get involved.

Steve Swenka prepares to chop up corn stalks in Tiffin, Iowa, on August 13, 2023. Most of Iowa was experiencing drought at this time, including Swenka’s farm. (Stefani Reynolds / AFP via Getty Images)

Stopping Trump’s Climate Censorship

The problem: Farmers are on the frontlines of climate change, facing back-to-back years of record losses from climate-fueled extreme weather. In 2023 alone, excessive heat and wildfires caused over $16.5 billion in crop losses.
The solution: Earthjustice has long pushed the federal government to help farmers adapt to climate change by adopting smart agriculture practices and reducing industrial agriculture’s climate impact. The Biden administration buoyed these efforts by including access to critical climate information and programs that help farmers make informed decisions in a changing environment.
Trump’s actions: The Trump administration removed climate-related information from government websites, including multiple Department of Agriculture sites. Farmers rely on these pages to adapt to increasingly extreme weather and learn what funding is available for adaptation projects.
Our response: Earthjustice sued Trump’s USDA, asking a court to restore access to vital climate information and prohibit further website purging. We argue that removing these webpages harms farmers who depend on USDA climate resources, as well as scientists and researchers who rely on USDA research and tools to study climate change.

Jeremy Brenner, top, and Billy Hall of Luminalt install solar panels on the roof of a home in Menlo Park, Calif., in 2022. (Jessica Christian / San Francisco Chronicle via AP)

Bringing Clean Energy to Everyone

The problem: In the past, purchasing solar panels, heat pumps, or electric vehicles was out of reach for many people. But if the U.S. is going to transition to a 100 percent clean energy economy, zero-emissions energy must be accessible and affordable to all.
The solution: In 2022, the Biden administration passed the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), a landmark climate law that contained billions of dollars in funding to help the middle class and small businesses be a part of the clean energy transition. Earthjustice fought against any proposals to weaken the law early on, and since its passage, we have worked to maximize the IRA’s climate benefits.
Trump’s actions: In one of his many attempts to abandon climate action, the Trump administration froze federal funding earlier this year appropriated by the Inflation Reduction Act for clean energy projects, leaving thousands of American suddenly in the lurch.
Our response: Earthjustice is suing the administration and the U.S. Department of Agriculture for illegally withholding funds earmarked by Congress through the Inflation Reduction Act. We filed this lawsuit on behalf of IRA grant recipients who have been harmed by the freeze in funding for projects, including farmers, local governments, community groups, and tribes.

We are just getting started. So far, the new administration has mostly released executive orders and rhetoric. When pronouncements become actual actions, we will be filing more legal challenges. Please donate today to strengthen our legal resources.