New York sues 3M, DuPont over toxic PFAS contamination claims

New York Attorney General Letitia James sued 3M, DuPont and related companies Thursday, accusing them of helping spread PFAS through consumer products and concealing the risks for decades. The case says the so-called forever chemicals contaminated New York communities and created long-term environmental and health problems, while the state seeks cleanup funding, consumer warnings and damages tied to alleged pollution and deception.

Filed in Albany County Supreme Court, the complaint names 3M Company; EIDP, Inc.; The Chemours Company, Inc.; The Chemours Company FC, LLC; Corteva, Inc.; and DuPont de Nemours, Inc. James’ office said the companies deceptively marketed products as safe, failed to warn New Yorkers about health and environmental risks and engaged in consumer-protection violations in addition to nuisance and failure-to-warn claims.

The state’s filing places the lawsuit inside a broader public-health and fiscal problem that has been building for years. New York has said PFAS were detected in almost 40% of its public drinking water supplies, including 60% of systems serving more than 10,000 people. In a 2019 coalition letter from 22 state attorneys general, New York said it had already spent more than $51 million on PFAS cleanup-related costs, with those expenses expected to keep rising.

PFAS have been linked in New York’s own materials to kidney and testicular cancer, thyroid disease, liver damage and immune system effects. The state has also said the chemicals persist in the environment and accumulate in the body, a warning that puts ordinary exposure pathways at the center of the case, from household goods to water systems and disposal sites.

James has previously pushed back on a proposed 3M settlement, arguing it could leave taxpayers responsible for drinking-water contamination costs. The new lawsuit expands that pressure by trying to force manufacturers to pay for remediation and by using consumer-protection law to argue the public was misled about products that may have contained PFAS, including cosmetics, non-stick cookware and other everyday items.

The action adds New York to a national wave of PFAS litigation as states and local governments try to shift cleanup costs to companies that profited from the chemicals. For manufacturers, the case raises the risk of broader settlement pressure and more demands to reformulate products, disclose ingredients more clearly and cover the cost of removing contamination that public systems have already been absorbing for years.