Trump Tower Ruled a ‘Public Nuisance'” for River Discharge

A jury is set to decide how much a Trump hotel will have to pay for pumping millions of gallons of heated water into a Chicago river.
The award is likely to run into many millions of dollars after Trump Tower in Chicago failed to install filters to stop fish from being sucked into its cooling system and also of pumping millions of gallons of heated water back into the Chicago river.
Cook County Circuit Court Judge, Thaddeus L. Wilson, accepted a claim from an environmentalist group that Chicago’s Trump Tower had caused a “public nuisance.”
“Defendant’s Motion for Summary Judgment Against Plaintiff-Intervenors’ Public Nuisance Claim is denied in its entirety,” he wrote.
“This matter is set for pre-trial status and setting a trial date on the issues of appropriate civil penalty and injunctive relief on November 4, 2024, at 11:00 a.m. The parties may either appear in-person in Courtroom 2307 or appear remotely via Zoom.”
Newsweek sought email comment from Chicago Trump International Hotel and Tower and from Donald Trump’s attorney on Tuesday.
The hotel was built along the Chicago River. In 2018, the state of Illinois, Friends of the Chicago River and the Sierra Club sued Trump after a permit review revealed that Trump Tower was consuming more than 20 million gallons of river water per day to cool the building.
Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul alleged in court documents that Trump ignored a requirement that he install a screen to prevent fish and other aquatic life from being sucked into the cooling pipes and killed.
Raoul entered into an agreement with Trump Tower, which agreed to report how much heated water it was pouring back into the Chicago river each month.
However, Raoul later alleged that the hotel had been deliberately underreporting how much heated water it was pumping back.
Cook County Circuit Court Judge Thaddeus L. Wilson granted summary judgment in favor of the plaintiffs on Monday and ruled Trump Tower responsible for creating a public nuisance.
“Defendant has created and continues to create a public nuisance in violation of Illinois law by operating its [permit] in a manner that substantially and unreasonably interferes with the public right to fish and otherwise recreate in the Chicago River,” Wilson ruled.
“The Court further finds that none of the matters raised in any of Defendant’s purported affirmative defenses to Plaintiff-Intervenors’ public nuisance claim provides any valid legal or factual basis to deny summary judgment to Plaintiff-Intervenors’ on that claim.”