Washington, DC – The following statement was released by Linda Kelly, senior vice president and general counsel of the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) and lead on the NAM’s Manufacturers’ Accountability Project (MAP), in response to New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio’s announcement that the city will sue energy manufacturers:

“Mayor de Blasio is just the latest mayor to lead his city into misguided litigation against America’s energy manufacturers. We’ve seen this activist playbook and these central players before, including plaintiff’s attorney Matt Pawa. This is part of a deep-rooted, politically-motivated campaign to undermine manufacturing in America, and we will continue our work to expose this coordinated effort.

“The mayor’s decision to play politics with underfunded pension plans and sue U.S. energy manufacturers is the same divisive approach we’ve seen fail to succeed time and again. Similar to recent lawsuits in California, this headline-seeking stunt is an absurd attempt to politicize natural disasters, rather than a good-faith effort at securing meaningful change. De Blasio is showing where his priorities really are by choosing to make his announcement flanked by controversial environmental activists. Ironically, this attack on energy manufacturers comes at a time that New Yorkers have depended on natural gas and heating oil to carry them through the recent extreme cold.

“The mayor’s announcement may raise his profile, but it will do nothing to address climate change and ultimately fail. The NAM’s Manufacturers’ Accountability Project will continue to highlight such abuses of our legal system so that manufacturers are not forced to waste resources that could be better invested in our workers or in real solutions for our environmental challenges.”

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The Manufacturers’ Accountability Project (MAP) will set the record straight and highlight the concerted, coordinated campaign being waged by plaintiffs’ lawyers, public officials, deep-pocketed foundations and other activists who have sought to undermine and weaken manufacturers in the United States. This campaign will pull back the curtain to expose these efforts and to hold key actors accountable in order to protect our members and American manufacturing workers. The MAP is a project of the NAM’s Manufacturers’ Center for Legal Action (MCLA), which serves as the leading voice of manufacturers in the nation’s courts. Visit us at mfgaccountabilityproject.org.