US fossil fuel lobbyists also represent hundreds of cities fighting for climate damages

Congressional lobbyists working for fossil fuel firms that are exacerbating the climate crisis are simultaneously representing more than 300 local governments raising funding to recover from climate damage, according to a new analysis. The research by F Minus and Make Polluters Pay reviewed congressional lobbying disclosures for the first quarter of 2026, finding that another 568 local governments hired fossil fuel lobbyists to work on non-climate related issues during that time, some of which included climate adjacent issues, like healthcare and home insurance. Dozens of lobbying firms were identified by researchers as working on both sides of climate action.

James Browning, the founder and executive director of F Minus, said local governments who hire these firms to lobby for climate mitigation, disaster relief, and wildlife conservation likely don’t know that the same firms are working for clients like ExxonMobil and the American Petroleum Institute (API), which critics say are pushing to further dependence on fossil fuels. For example, the analysis shows US multinational law firm Greenberg Traurig has lobbied for three fossil fuel entities (API, ConocoPhillips and the Western States Petroleum Association in California) that have opposed state-level legislation aimed at holding fossil fuel companies financially accountable for their historic climate-warming emissions and using that revenue, in the form of climate superfunds, to support climate mitigation costs. Miami-Dade county, in Florida, hired the firm to lobby for shoreline protection and Everglades restoration.

The mayor of Miami-Dade county didn’t respond to a request for comment about the perceived conflict of interest. Westchester county and the city of Rochester, both in New York, also hired Greenberg Traurig, despite the fact that these local governments could lose mitigation monies if fossil fuel clients of the firm are successful in invalidating New York’s climate superfund legislation, Browning said. Greenberg Traurig also didn’t respond to a request for comment about working for local governments that are seeking funding for climate-related damage, while also representing fossil fuel companies.

In a 2024 interview with LEADERS magazine, the lobbying firm’s executive chairman, Richard Rosenbaum, said that the firm has expanded its reach and capabilities “to advise clients who are building a more sustainable world”. New York and Vermont passed climate superfund legislation in 2024. This year, another 13 states considered such laws.

Cassidy DiPaola, with the pro-climate superfund campaign Make Polluters Pay, said that member groups in the states where superfund legislation has been introduced reported having encouraging conversations with lawmakers about the bills, only to later see those same lawmakers vote against the legislation. For example, in New Jersey, organizers saw more than a hundred business groups oppose climate superfund legislation, but more public testimony taken in favor of the bill overall. But across all four times climate superfund bills were introduced in New Jersey, more registered lobbyists opposed the legislation than supported it.

In every state legislature where the bills were introduced, fossil fuel companies opposed them. The Brown University Climate and Development Lab (CDL) report looks at the “war of words” recorded in the publicly available testimony and lobbying records on climate superfund bills. But there is no way to systematically analyze the influence lobbyists have in closed-door meetings with legislators, said Timmons Roberts, who heads the CDL.