Seventeen state financial officers have signed a letter urging the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to scrap climate-related disclosure rules implemented during President Joe Biden’s administration. The regulations require publicly traded companies to conduct costly environmental reviews to report greenhouse gas emissions and other climate metrics.
The signatories argue that the rules represent an “unlawful expansion of the administrative state” designed to hinder private sector economic growth. They cite the SEC’s own economic analysis, which estimates that rescinding the Final Rules could generate annualized savings of approximately $4.9 billion and total cost savings on the order of $7.9 billion.
The rules were adopted by the SEC in March 2024. Opponents launched numerous legal challenges consolidated in the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit. The agency itself stayed the rules in April 2024 pending legal resolution, but President Donald Trump’s election made the stay permanent. In March 2025, the SEC under Acting Chairman Mark Uyeda declined to defend the rule.
The letter states: “Americans want the SEC focused on protecting markets and investors, not turning our capital markets into a vehicle for climate activism.”
Utah Treasurer Marlo Oaks, a signatory of the letter, stated that “the Trump SEC is right to rescind the climate disclosure rule and refocus the agency on its fundamental responsibility of protecting investors and maintaining fair, orderly, and efficient markets.”
American Energy Institute CEO Jason Isaac also supported the move, adding: “Washington bureaucrats shouldn’t be weaponizing financial regulations to pressure companies into advancing far-left ESG policies that Congress never approved.”
The letter was submitted ahead of an August 3 comment deadline regarding the rule’s potential rescission.
