California sues Trump admin over federal oil pipeline jurisdiction dispute

California Attorney General Rob Bonta announced Friday that the state is filing a lawsuit against the Trump administration over the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) asserting federal jurisdiction over the state’s two oil pipelines and greenlighting their restart.

The lawsuit alleges that the Trump administration “illegally gave Sable Offshore Corp. the green light to reinject oil through onshore pipelines that begin and terminate within California, begin in Santa Barbara County and terminate in Kern County,” Bonta said at a news conference in Dockweiler State Beach.

He noted that one of two Los Flores pipelines ruptured in 2015 due to pipe corrosion, causing the catastrophic oil spill in the Refugio area that “dropped more than 100,000 gallons of heavy crude oil into the environment and at least 21,000 gallons of oil into the ocean.”

Bonta claimed that PHMSA’s approval to restart the pipeline is “the latest example of Trump doing the oil industry’s bidding.”

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Bonta claims that because the pipelines are located only in California without crossing state lines and without entering federal waters, “oversight of pipelines is subject to the state of California, not the federal government.”

“The Trump administration illegally undermined California’s authority, illegally federalized pipelines, usurped state control, and illegally issued Sable a sham emergency permit to start pumping oil when there was no emergency at all,” he said.

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“In short, the Trump administration has violated the law again, and that is why we are suing again.”

Rob Bonta announced the pipeline lawsuit at Dockweiler State Beach on Friday. (California Attorney General/YouTube)

Bonta said this marks the 55th lawsuit California has filed against the Trump administration.

He said the lawsuit is not about whether the pipelines should be restarted, but whether California or the Trump administration will make the decision.

“The answer is clear: the state of California will decide,” Bonta said.

Workers clean up after the disastrous Refugio oil spill in 2015. (Al-Seeb/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)

He explained that Sable asked the Trump administration to declare the pipelines “interstate,” meaning that “the pipelines are part of a larger system that extends into federal waters on the outer continental shelf. This is fiction. This is not true.”

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He described this as “an excuse to usurp state control.”

Fox News Digital has reached out to the White House for comment.