Rabat – A group of 22 young people from across the United States have filed a federal lawsuit accusing President Donald Trump of violating their constitutional rights by issuing executive orders that expand fossil fuel production, worsening climate change.
The lawsuit – “Youth v. Trump”— was filed last week in the US District Court in Montana. It claims Trump’s executive orders knowingly promote policies that increase greenhouse gas pollution, pushing the global climate toward dangerous instability.
The case targets three executive orders issued by Trump titled: “Unleashing American Energy,” “Declaring a National Energy Emergency,” and “Reinvigorating America’s Beautiful Clean Coal Industry.”
The plaintiffs, aged 7 to 25 and living from Montana to Florida, say they’ve been directly harmed by wildfires, floods, hurricanes, and extreme heat. Some have been displaced from their homes, while a 7-year-old boy identified as J.K., has suffered serious health problems due to respiratory infections worsened by wildfire smoke, leading to multiple hospitalizations.
The lawsuit argues that these impacts violate the plaintiffs’ constitutional rights to life and liberty, and also break laws meant to protect public health and the environment. The plaintiffs are asking the court to declare the executive orders unconstitutional, stop their enforcement, and reaffirm legal limits on presidential power.
“From day one of the current administration, President Trump has issued directives to increase fossil fuel use and block the transition to clean energy like wind, solar, batteries, and electric vehicles,” the lawsuit states. It adds that Trump’s claim of an energy emergency is false, and that the real emergency is the damage caused by fossil fuel pollution.
The young plaintiffs are represented by Our Children’s Trust, an Oregon-based legal group known for the 2015 Juliana v. United States case, which argued that the government has long known fossil fuels drive climate change but failed to act.
Alongside President Trump, the lawsuit casts a wide net targeting powerful federal agencies and top officials as defendants. Among them are the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Department of Transportation, the National Science Foundation, and the Department of Health and Human Services.
Also listed are two of the country’s leading science institutions — NASA and NOAA — agencies that have long sounded the alarm on climate change but are now accused of contributing to the climate crisis by complying with the harmful executive orders.
In a statement for Inside Climate News, the White House dismissed the case as part of “the left’s radical climate agenda,” and said Americans are more focused on economic and national security, which it argues are supported by Trump’s efforts to restore US energy dominance.
The United States experienced 28 weather and climate disasters in 2024, ranging from severe storms, tropical cyclones, winter storms, floods, drought, heat-waves and wildfires. The 2023 Fifth National Climate Assessment estimated the costs of “severe weather” at roughly $150 billion each year — a conservative estimate that excludes loss of life, healthcare-related costs and damages to the ecosystem.
