Honored by your enemies — The Roger Worthington story

By Lesley Clark, Hailey Fuchs, Corbin Hiar and Chelsea Harvey 07/15/2026

This blog is edited for length. For the entire history goto POLITICO here. It’s well worth your time.

It’s a rare occurrence for a private lawyer to be hauled before a congressional committee and be deposed. But in the sharply political world of climate and energy litigation, Roger Worthington is no ordinary lawyer.

A champion among environmental activists and a villain to the Trump administration and congressional Republicans, the ambitious attorney’s latest gambit — representing Multnomah County, Oregon, in a $51 billion lawsuit that accuses the oil and gas industry of contributing to a heat wave that killed 69 people in 2021 — has landed him in the hot seat before the House Judiciary Committee.

The 65-year-old, who made his name taking asbestos manufacturers to court, will be questioned Wednesday by Republicans who are investigating what they say are efforts to influence judges overseeing climate lawsuits, like the one brought by Worthington’s firm and two others on behalf of the county that includes Portland.

His appearance — ordered by congressional subpoena — is the latest flash point in a high-stakes legal and political battle over a swath of lawsuits brought by more than two dozen city and state governments seeking to hold oil and gas producers financially accountable for climate change. The industry has warned that the lawsuits could cost it tens of billions of dollars. House and Senate Republicans have filed legislation to wipe out the litigation.

Blocking the lawsuits has emerged as one priority for the Trump administration amid its broader effort to stifle climate initiatives. The Department of Justice has filed unsuccessful lawsuits to block climate cases brought by Hawaii and Michigan, as well as derail a lawsuit by Minnesota. And the Supreme Court this fall is poised to hold oral arguments on the industry’s bid to quash the cases.

Worthington took center stage from the moment Multnomah County commissioners announced the launch of the landmark climate lawsuit in June 2023 in front of a Portland courthouse.

“They’re in the business of extracting carbon from the earth, converting it into a gas form and polluting our sky, and we have to pay the price,” Worthington thundered as he joined — and out-talked — the elected officials. “No more, not here, not now.”

It’s not the first time he’s taken on corporate polluters. He dragged asbestos manufacturers into court for over 20 years, earning more than $1 billion for clients who were dying of cancer. That shaped his outlook for the climate case, which he warned “wasn’t going to be easy.” The fossil fuel industry, he predicted, would “fight like the dickens” to protect itself.

Three years later, as he arrives in Washington for the closed-door grilling, his words are prescient in ways he and the team of attorneys — which includes veterans of tobacco and opioid litigation — say they never imagined: With lawmakers scrutinizing an attorney in an active case that Republicans have opposed politically.

It prompted Worthington to accuse lawmakers of “throwing Big Oil a bone they can chew on” by demanding he appear before them. GOP Rep. Darrell Issa of California, who chairs the Judiciary subcommittee with jurisdiction over courts, said people who assert that the committee is doing the oil industry’s bidding are “full of shit, and you can quote that.”

Lawmakers “want to hear the truth,” Issa said. “It’ll be under oath, and we expect that we’ll either have a ‘Take the Fifth’ or we’ll get, we hope, the truth.”

Worthington’s friends say he’s up to the task.

“They say you’re honored by who your enemies are,” said Matt Bergman, who has known Worthington since 1997 when he was setting up his own asbestos litigation firm. “The fact that Roger is being excoriated, disparaged and called to testify speaks to the risk and the threat his legal advocacy presents to established power.”

Visit the takenote.ca HOME page for a colourful display of hundreds of other blogs which may interest or inspire you