Overview
- The Supreme Court clerk told lawyers on Sept. 28 that Justice Samuel Alito "has determined that he will not continue to participate in this case," a one-line letter that gave no reason for the recusal.
- Alito’s withdrawal leaves eight justices to hear Suncor Energy v. County Commissioners of Boulder County on Oct. 5 and creates a real risk of a 4-4 tie that would leave the lower-court decision allowing Boulder’s suit to proceed.
- Alito’s 2025 financial disclosures show holdings in oil and gas companies such as ConocoPhillips and Phillips 66, and advocacy and watchdog groups had pressed him and asked the Senate Judiciary Committee to investigate his participation.
- The case asks whether federal law displaces state tort claims for climate harms, an issue the Department of Justice and the EPA have recently weighed in on in ways that complicate the federal preemption argument.
- The unexplained recusal has intensified calls for greater judicial transparency and stronger conflict rules, highlighting that justices are not required to explain recusals and that the Court’s 2023 code of conduct offers no binding disclosure mechanism.