SACRAMENTO, Calif. (Legal Newsline) – The California Chamber of Commerce is legally challenging the state's Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment's (OEHHA) requirement to provide cancer warnings to consumers about exposure to acrylamide per California's Proposition 65.
The California Chamber of Commerce filed a complaint Oct. 7 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California against California Attorney General Xavier Becerra seeking declaratory and injunctive relief.
According to the suit, under California's Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of 1986 (Proposition 65), the cancer warning labels must apply to any chemical deemed by the OEHHA as one known to cause cancer.
The suit states acrylamide is formed in food naturally when processed with heat or cooked to high temperatures and the OEHHA has listed it as a carcinogen.
The chamber alleges in its suit that a "cancer warning for acrylamide in food products that are intended for human consumption conveys to consumers the false and misleading message that consuming the products will increase consumers’ risk of cancer, even though there is no reliable evidence that exposure to dietary acrylamide increases the risk of cancer in humans."
The plaintiff seeks preliminary and permanent injunctions from enforcement of Proposition 65 regarding acrylamide, monetary relief and all other just relief. It is represented by Trenton Norris, Sarah Esmaili, S. Zachary Fayne and David Barnes of Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer in San Francisco.
U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California case number 2:19-CV-02019-KJM-EFB