California Attorney General Rob Bonta and a coalition of environmental nonprofits sued ExxonMobil on Monday, alleging the gas giant enacted a “decades-long campaign of deception” that fueled a global plastic pollution crisis.

The two novel lawsuits filed in San Francisco Superior Court will seek civil remedies from ExxonMobil for environmental destruction, public health harms, and an end to its “deceptive practices” that they argue have led to plastic being found from the depths of the ocean to the peak of Mount Everest.

The Surfrider Foundation, based in San Clemente, and Heal the Bay, based in Santa Monica, were among the nonprofits involved in the second lawsuit.

“ExxonMobil lied to further its record-breaking profits at the expense of our planet and possibly jeopardizing our health,” Bonta said in a statement. “Today’s lawsuit shows the fullest picture to date of ExxonMobil’s decades-long deception.”

The converging lawsuits against ExxonMobil will attempt to prove the corporation systematically led the public to believe that plastic waste can be safely disposed of through recycling and failed to share information about toxic “forever” chemicals and the lasting environmental harms of plastic. If successful, the lawsuits would compel ExxonMobil to end its “deceptive” practices and could secure hundreds of millions to support climate change solutions.

ExxonMobil is one of the oldest and largest gas and plastics companies in the world with a market cap of $512 billion. The company has been the focus of numerous lawsuits over environmental harms in recent decades. Past lawsuits involved the Valdez oil spill off the coast of Alaska, climate change denial and deception about the carcinogenic properties of benzene.

ExxonMobil did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

“For 40 years, the Surfrider Foundation has been fighting to protect our ocean, waves, and beaches,” Jennifer Savage, the Surfrider Foundation’s senior plastic pollution initiative manager said in a statement. “We’ve battled plastic pollution through beach cleanups, public education, and commonsense policy initiatives at the local, state, and federal levels. Despite these tireless efforts, 85% of items collected in our California beach cleanups in 2023 were still single-use plastics.

“Now, for the health of our ocean and the people who depend on it, we’re taking this fight to court to hold Exxon accountable for their contribution to the plastic pollution crisis.”

Tracy Quinn, the president and CEO of Heal the Bay, said “plastic is choking the life out of our ocean.”

“It’s turning California shorelines into waste dumps,” Quinn said in a statement. “And it’s also draining our pocketbooks. California taxpayers shell out an estimated $420 million each year to clean up and prevent plastic pollution from fouling our public places. Public money should be used for public good — not subsidizing big profits for Big Plastic.”

Bonta delivered the opening remarks of the news conference Monday morning, detailing the extent of the alleged harm perpetuated by ExxonMobil’s plastic production and its ongoing effort to misinform the public about plastic recycling. Bonta emphasized the importance of seeking remedies and abating further harm in the suits rather than punitive damages against the oil giant.

“We are not seeking damages in the form of traditional damages,” Bonta said, “We are demanding ExxonMobil fund, in all likelihood to the tune of billions of dollars, to abate the harm of their deceit, their lying, their perpetuation of the myth of recycling.”

Niall McCarthy, a partner in Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy representing nonprofits in the lawsuit, described the case as a “first of its kind” between a state attorney general and nonprofits in the fight against climate change. McCarthy said the trove of evidence, both subpoenaed through traditional legal requests and published in news outlets’ investigations, will shed light on the decadeslong campaign to promote plastic to the detriment of consumers and the environment.

“We’ve uncovered a wealth of information about Exxon through the work of these nonprofits and the lawyers exposing what they did going back to the 70s, so we feel like we’re in a pretty strong position,” McCarthy said. “But whenever you file a one-of-a-kind lawsuit, there are certainly challenges.”

Sierra Club President Allison Chin characterized plastic pollution as the “defining environmental issue of our time,” comparing it to the lawsuits against Big Tobacco that became the model for suing large corporations. Chin stated the lawsuit marks a turning point in the environmental movement by taking a more aggressive approach toward polluters.

“Like the tobacco industry before them, Exxon has run a decadeslong campaign to hide the true risk of plastic from the public. Exxon profited by claiming plastics are safe, disposable and recyclable. That wasn’t true,” Chin said. “No company has the right to pollute with impunity.”