State sues ExxonMobil over 'misleading' plastic recycling promises

As it turns out, those “recyclable” plastic bags at grocery stores weren’t as sustainable as California lawmakers intended.

While the Legislature and Gov. Gavin Newsom acted to ban the thicker plastic bags as of Jan. 1, 2026, state officials aren’t done going after what they describe as the false promises of plastic recycling.

Attorney General Rob Bonta announced Sunday that his office is filing suit against ExxonMobil “for allegedly engaging in a decades-long campaign of deception that caused and exacerbated the global plastics pollution crisis.”

“The Department of Justice alleges that ExxonMobil has been deceiving Californians for half a century through misleading public statements and slick marketing promising that recycling would address the ever-increasing amount of plastic waste ExxonMobil produces,” the release said. “Through this lawsuit, the Attorney General seeks to compel ExxonMobil, which promotes and produces the largest amount of polymers—essentially the building blocks used to make single-use plastic—that become plastic waste in California, to end its deceptive practices that threaten the environment and the public.”

On X, formerly Twitter, Bonta promoted his appearance at Climate Week in New York City by taking a more direct shot at the company.

“Plastics are everywhere, causing irreversible damage,” he said. “We’re going to make ExxonMobil clean up the mess it made.”

The plastic bag bill and this lawsuit come after years of issues with plastic bags, which were supposed to be banned a decade ago, and the proliferation of plastics nearly everywhere on Earth and in our own bodies.