Around 2017, multiple cities in the United States began filing lawsuits against oil & gas companies, asserting their worldwide activities in mining and production of petroleum products were responsible for climate change effects in their cities and states.

[5] The oil companies petitioned to the Supreme Court to resolve the circuit split with regards to the federal-officer removal statute.

In a 7–1 ruling, the Court vacated the Fourth Circuit's decision and remanded the case for further review.

The majority agreed with BP and other petitioning companied that the Fourth Circuit erred in considering all factors for review to deny the change of jurisdiction requested by the city, thus vacating their decision but otherwise not ruling on the merits of Baltimore's complaints related to the petitioners.

"[10] Sotomayor wrote the dissent, stating her concern that the decision "will reward defendants for raising strained theories of removal".

[10] By May 24, 2021, the Court subsequently granted review of three other similar cases in which a city or state had successfully changed jurisdiction in an environmental lawsuit, vacating the Circuit court rulings that allowed these changes to proceed on the basis of the BP opinion, and remanding these cases for further review.