It turns out that New York City is hardly the only climate plaintiff to face the January blues this year. Yesterday, the Anne Arundel Circuit Court dismissed Annapolis and Anne Arundel’s climate lawsuits against America’s energy industry, delivering yet another devastating blow to the already struggling, nationally-coordinated climate litigation campaign.

Notably, less than a year ago, Anne Arundel Circuit Court Judge Steve Platt denied energy companies’ motions to dismiss the pair of Maryland municipalities’ climate litigation cases. However, after the plaintiffs filed retooled complaints in June 2024 and energy company defendants responded with new motions to dismiss, Judge Platt found himself “persuaded on this second go-round.”

Specifically, he referenced the nearby Baltimore Circuit Court’s decision to dismiss Baltimore’s case, along with other recent decisions to throw out similar lawsuits filed in other states:

“Upon further review, this Court is now persuaded that the logic of the disposition and the authorities cited by Senior Judge Videtta A. Brown in the Baltimore case, the ruling by the Superior Court Judge in the Delaware case and the ruling in the New York case as well as the Second Circuit’s affirmance of that ruling compel dismissal of these cases for Court’s decision last July to dismiss a similar the reasons stated below.” (emphasis added)

After climate plaintiffs spent years fighting for these cases to be heard in state court, and even despite SCOTUS’ refusal to intervene, the strategy is clearly not panning out in favor of the activists and their wealthy backers.

Read the full post at EIDClimate.org.

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