A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit filed on behalf of 18 California children that alleges federal climate-change policies discriminate against minors because the brunt of the resulting health risks will be assumed by children rather than adults.
Judge Michael Fitzgerald of the Central District of California issued the order on May 8, concluding that the plaintiffs had raised potential injuries that the court could not redress. The plaintiffs, who are represented by the Oregon-based Our Children’s Trust, argued that plaintiffs were disproportionately harmed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s use of “discount rates” when determining a cost-benefit analysis on pollution rules affecting multiple generations.
“The only relief that could arguably mitigate plaintiffs’ injuries is a judgment declaring (the) defendants’ use of discriminatory discount rates as unconstitutional,” Fitzgerald said. “Even then, however, plaintiffs have failed to show how this is substantially likely to remedy the injuries to plaintiffs’ ‘bodies, their homes and their daily lives.’”
The plaintiffs allege that they have been disproportionately harmed by pollution sources due to their “activity patterns, behaviors and biology as children.”
Fitzgerald’s dismissal of the case, however, allows the plaintiffs to file an amended complaint by May 20, and Our Children’s Trust has vowed to do that. The group’s co-executive director, Mat dos Santos, also called the court’s decision “unjust and dangerous” and poses a threat to constitutional rights, given that the plaintiffs argued their rights to equal protection and due process were violated.
“Courts have a responsibility to hear constitutional violations, as they've done in many important cases in our nation’s history,” dos Santos said in a statement emailed to the Southern California Record. “If allowed to go to trial, these young people will demonstrate that their constitutional rights have been violated. We will be filing an amended complaint.”
Catherine Smith, the counsel for Our Children’s Trust, noted that children’s ability to make societal changes is less than adults because they can’t vote and thus lack access to the political system.
“If allowed to go to trial, this case will pull back the curtain and show that the federal government unjustifiably places a lesser economic value on the lives of children than the lives of adults and that its failure to reduce carbon emissions inflicts lifelong injuries on young people in violation of their fundamental rights and equal protection of laws,” Smith said.
In the original legal complaint, the plaintiffs sought multiple declarations against the EPA, including a finding that the agency violated the rights of children by using discriminatory discount rates, allowing harmful levels of climate pollution to accumulate and burdening children’s ability to simply enjoy their lives.
“(Plaintiffs seek) a declaration that the fundamental right to a life-sustaining climate system is encompassed within the Fifth Amendment’s substantive due-process fundamental right to life and is also inseparable from fundamental rights to liberty and property,” the complaint states.
The lawsuit also pointed to conditions specific to children who live in California and subjected to wildfire risks and other climate-driven dangers.