U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito last week recused himself from oral arguments in the Louisiana coastal erosion case Chevron USA v. Plaquemines Parish, raising new-found concerns among tort-reform advocates over the lawsuit’s potential outcome.
A Jan. 8 letter from the clerk of the court, Scott S. Harris, said Alito could no longer take part in the case due to his having a financial interest in ConocoPhillips, the parent company of Burlington Resources Oil and Gas Co., one of the defendants in last year’s state court proceedings. The letter explains Alito’s lateness in recusing himself from the case, which the high court agreed to hear last spring.
“Justice Alito initially decided not to recuse because on June 2, 2025, Burlington was dismissed as a petitioner in this court … after Burlington advised the court by letter that it was ‘withdrawing’ from the petition and that ‘neither Burlington Resources nor ConocoPhillips will be a party to (or have any other involvement in) the above-referenced case,” the letter says. “Later briefing, however, noted that Burlington remained a party in the district court.”
The main issue before the Supreme Court is whether the Plaquemines Parish case – and more than 40 more similar cases launched by parishes against energy companies – falls under the purview of the federal-officer removal statute and should be tried in federal rather than state court.
Petitioner Chevron and its affiliates argue that their operations in coastal Louisiana to extract oil and gas resources was carried out at the behest of a federal government directive to provide aviation fuel to support the nation’s military actions during World War II. The petitioners and their supporters say the connection between such energy extraction activities and federal supply contracts means the coastal erosion lawsuits ought to be heard in federal courts.
But the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals last year sided with federal district courts and remanded the coastal erosion lawsuits to state courts, concluding that the energy companies’ production activities decades ago were not sufficiently connected with their federal refinery contracts.
Last year, a Plaquemines Parish jury handed down a $745 million verdict against Chevron for energy industry environmental damage in the coastal region.
“It’s interesting that Justice Alito chose to recuse himself from (Monday’s) hearing because of a stockholder interest in another energy company that was not a party to this case,” Lana Venable, executive director for Louisiana Lawsuit Abuse Watch (LLAW), told the Louisiana Record in an email. “His recusal could result in a 4-4 vote, upholding the decision of the state court and solidifying state jurisdiction for the remaining coastal suits.”
Venable said she hopes this will not be the cast, adding that LLAW views the coastal lawsuits as falling under the federal-officer removal statute. That federal law ensures that entities serving the nation’s strategic interests won’t be unfairly targeted in state courts for actions taken at the behest of federal officials, she said.
“Also interesting is the fact that attorneys affiliated with the firm handling this case contributed $15,000 to the presiding judge in state court, resulting in the precedent-setting $745 ‘nuclear verdict’ against Chevron,” Venable said.
Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill, however, said the cases belong in state court.
“While most people know this already, it is also important to note that WWII ended in 1945,” Murrill said in a prepared statement before the oral arguments. “Texaco/Chevron’s activities did not. Evidence in one case alone showed 4 billion gallons of toxic production wastewater was continually dumped into our marsh and that it caused long-term damage.”
But groups like the Washington Legal Foundation (WLF), a nonprofit public-interest law firm, submitted briefs to the court supporting the energy companies’ arguments for removing the cases from state courts.
“Removal protects national defense by shielding contractors from state-court bias,” the WLF brief says. “State courts often risk favoring local interests, looking askance at federal defenses like preemption, as Plaquemines Parish’s $744.6 million verdict here confirms.”
