A Second Round with William Barr on Litigation Over Interstate Pollution

A Second Round with William Barr on Litigation Over Interstate Pollution

After I responded with a letter to the editor to William Barr's Wall Street Journal op-ed arguing that state-law-based tort suits against fossil fuel companies seeking redress for climate-related harms are preempted, Barr responded with a letter of his own, to which I offered a sur-reply. Here is a quick review of the argument, with some additional commentary. In his initial op-ed, Barr argued that "disputes involving pollution that crosses stat…