/>iOn July 28, 2025, the Republican Attorney-General of Florida announced that his office had “issued subpoenas to investigate whether the CDP (formerly the Climate Disclosure Project) and the Science Based Targets Initiative (SBTi) violated state consumer protection or antitrust law.” Specifically, according to the Florida Attorney-General, these two organizations “coerc[ed] companies into disclosing proprietary data and paying for access under the guise of environmental transparency,” in particular by “charging companies to report, revise, and promote their data--while selling services that allegedly improve scores,” including “sell[ing] companies validation of their climate goals.” According to the press release announcing this investigation, the Florida Attorney-General characterized these organizations' activity as “fraudulent ESG schemes masquerading as science.”
These related organizations--the CDP helped facilitate the growth of the SBTi--typically focus on environmental reporting and risk management. A number of these services are provided to individual companies. While the details of the Florida Attorney-General's investigation are not yet completely clear, it appears that the Florida Attorney-General is focused on, among other things, “[w]hether CDP's efforts to pressure or punish companies that don't participate result in anticompetitive effects” and whether SBTi and CDP “creat[e] inventives for corporations to pay in exchange for favorable treatment.” In other words, whether ostensibly neutral standards applied to companies are potentially being manipulated by the gatekeeping organizations.
This investigation is emblematic of the proliferating number of anti-ESG investigations, litigations, and filings undertaken in recent months by a number of different Republican Attorneys-General, from a swathe of red states. These state law enforcement officers (who are typically practicing politicians) have apparently decided that these anti-ESG enforcement actions are not only beneficial to their states, but also to their political reputations. It seems likely that these sort of anti-ESG enforcement activities will continue, and even expand, during the current political environment.
Attorney General James Uthmeier today announced that his office issued subpoenas to investigate whether the CDP (formerly the Climate Disclosure Project) and the Science Based Targets Initiative (SBTi) violated state consumer protection or antitrust laws by coercing companies into disclosing proprietary data and paying for access under the guise of environmental transparency. “Radical climate activists have hijacked corporate governance and weaponized it against the free market,” said Attorney General James Uthmeier. “Florida will not sit back while international pressure groups shake down American companies to fund their ESG grift. We’re using every tool of the law to stop the Climate Cartel from exploiting businesses and misleading consumers.”
