California officials have been working for months on a plan to “Trump proof” the state’s leading-edge environmental and climate policies, in the event that former President Donald Trump returns to White House and follows through on his promise to gut them.

Whether California succeeds could affect more than a dozen other states that follow its emissions rules, and could have global impact because the state’s market muscle compels automakers and other companies to conform to California standards.

The strategy now being crafted in Sacramento, California’s capital, includes lawsuits designed to reach wide-ranging settlements with industries that generate greenhouse gases, and new rules and laws that rely on state authority and would be beyond the reach of the administration.

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Trump Believes Climate Change Is a ‘Hoax’

Trump, who considers climate change a “hoax,” has promised to weaken every major federal climate regulation, as he did in his first term.

But he is also expected to try to blow up California’s climate policies, which have set the pace for the rest of the nation and the world. The state is requiring about three-quarters of new trucks sold there after 2035 to be zero emissions. And in a request that is pending, California wants permission from the Biden administration to enact one of the most ambitious climate rules of any nation: a ban on the sale of new gas-powered passenger vehicles in the state after 2035.

Both rules are far tougher than federal policy and could have influence beyond the United States, given California’s standing as the world’s fifth-largest economy. China and the European Union have already adopted parts of California’s car and truck tailpipe-emissions reduction programs.

The Democratic-controlled state Legislature has also passed a first-in-the-nation law requiring major companies to disclose their greenhouse emissions. And it has strengthened the authority of local governments to shut down oil and gas projects in their communities. Next month, Californians will be asked to approve a ballot measure to create a $10 billion “climate bond” to pay for climate and environmental projects.

Under a provision of the 1970 Clean Air Act, the Environmental Protection Agency has for decades given California a waiver that allows it to enact pollution controls that are stricter than federal regulations. Federal law also allows other states under certain circumstances to adopt California’s standards as their own.

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Sixteen states have pledged to follow the California car rule and 10 states have adopted the truck rule, meaning that the California regulations would apply to about 40% of the U.S. auto market.

Trump has promised to revoke the waiver. “California has imposed the most ridiculous car regulations anywhere in the world, with mandates to move to all electric cars,” Trump has said. “I will terminate that.”

At the same time, the legality of the waiver is being challenged by 17 Republican attorneys general and several oil groups in a lawsuit that may head to the U.S. Supreme Court.

On the campaign trail, Trump has continued his long-running feud with California’s Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom. Trump has called him an “environmental maniac” who is “crushing our great automakers in Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina, crushing them under his leadership.”

A spokesperson for the Trump campaign, Karoline Leavitt, declined to comment on California’s plans.

Newsom Intends to Build Climate Regulations

Newsom, who is seen as having White House ambitions of his own, has made clear that he intends to forge ahead on environmental regulation regardless of whether Trump returns to the presidency.

“California has long led the nation in pioneering climate policies and innovation,” said Newsom in a statement. “Those efforts will continue for years to come. That includes partnerships with private companies, such as automakers, and agreements with other countries — everywhere from China to Norway to Canada — to combat the climate crisis together.”

Other top Democrats in the state, including Attorney General Rob Bonta, are working with the state’s climate regulator, the California Air Resources Board, on the “Trump-proofing” strategy. Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas said the Legislature will be ready to meet in a special session after the November election if necessary.

When Trump became president in 2017, California officials were caught flat-footed, said Mary Nichols, who was the state’s top climate regulator from 2007 to 2020 and now informally advises state policymakers. “It came as a shock,” she said.

As the Trump administration dismantled Obama-era environmental rules and then took aim at California’s policies, the state fought back, Nichols said. California filed more than 70 climate and environmental lawsuits against the Trump administration, prevailing in more than half of them.

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That kind of record is not assured in the future, in part because Trump reshaped the nation’s courts, appointing more than 200 federal judges. Those appointments include three Supreme Court justices, who helped form a conservative supermajority that delivered decisions to restrict the government’s authority to regulate climate, air and water pollution. As soon as January, the court could hear the case that is challenging California’s waiver under the Clean Air Act.

State officials and lawmakers are working to try to protect California’s policies even if it loses its waiver.

They plan to build on their most successful legal gambit during Trump’s first term. In 2019, the Trump administration revoked California’s waiver — the first time the federal government had done so since the Clean Air Act was passed in 1970. The Biden administration would later restore it, but the lapse had limited impact because California had secretly struck legal agreements with four of the world’s largest automakers — Ford, Volkswagen, Honda and BMW — to reduce their tailpipe emissions according to limits set by the state.

The move blindsided and enraged Trump, and his administration in turn threatened to withhold federal highway funds from California, unsuccessfully sued the state for partnering with Quebec on its emissions-reduction program, and opened an antitrust investigation into the automakers that signed on to the deal.

But the deal with automakers, which expires in 2026, endured and grew: Volvo and Stellantis have since signed on. California regulators are now talking to the companies about even stricter emissions limits, and expanding the agreement to include other automakers and possibly other states.

“We are going to fight back hard,” said Phil Weiser, the Democratic attorney general of Colorado. “We are going to coordinate.”

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This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

By Coral Davenport/Todd Heisler
c. 2024 The New York Times Company