The goal may be to pressure companies into abandoning the initiatives.
Two new fronts have opened up in the ongoing attack by Republican attorneys general on sustainability organizations.
Ten AGs last week warned close to 80 companies that their work with three packaging initiatives — the U.S. Plastics Pact, Consumer Goods Forum and Sustainable Packaging Coalition — may violate antitrust and consumer protection laws. The move follows a January letter containing related allegations that another group of Republican AGs sent to Ceres, a nonprofit that works with investors on sustainability issues.
The lead author on both letters was Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier, who has previously subpoenaed two mainstays of corporate sustainability efforts, the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) and CDP.
The most consistent theme in Uthmeier’s letters is the accusation that efforts to have companies comply with voluntary standards, or to collaborate on issues such as reducing plastic in packaging, constitute anticompetitive behavior. Legal scholars dispute this, noting that several precedents distinguish between such work and abuses by cartels.
“Voluntary standard-setting organizations have long been protected under antitrust law,” said Cynthia Hanawalt, a researcher at Columbia University’s Sabin Center for Climate Change Law. “That’s fairly settled.”
The U.S. Plastic Pact, Consumer Goods Forum and Ceres all told Trellis that they are confident that their activities do not violate U.S. laws. CDP, SBTi and GreenBlue, the nonprofit that operates the Sustainable Packaging Coalition, did not share responses.
Yet courtroom victories may not be the end game for Uthmeier, a former chief of staff for Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, and his fellow AGs.
In their letter to the roughly 80 companies working on packaging, the AGs reference a previous series of Republican attacks on two finance-industry sustainability organizations, the Net-Zero Insurance Alliance and the Net-Zero Banking Alliance. Many members quit the organizations after the attacks and both are now defunct. The initiatives may have failed for other reasons, but the letter puts the blame on the legal risks identified by Republican critics. Uthmeier and his co-signatories also note that companies that left the groups avoided “the need for further enforcement action.”
The theory that the letters are more about damaging sustainability organizations and persuading members to quit is bolstered by the fact that the majority of the attacks take the form of letters rather than legal filings.
“There’s very little actual litigation or courtroom results coming from out of this,” said Hanawalt. “But I think litigation may not be the goal here. This is not typical behavior. Prosecutors tend to investigate first and they only bring claims they can win. The press releases usually come out at the end. We’re seeing these investigations now function more as pressure campaigns.”
Uthmeier’s office did not respond to requests for comment.
