FIRST ON FOX: A controversial legal advocacy group funded by left-wing nonprofits continues to work with judges and experts involved in climate change lawsuits, despite publicly downplaying the extent of those connections.
“CJP does not participate in litigation, assist or coordinate with any party in litigation, or advise judges on how to rule in each case,” Jordan Diamond, president of the Environmental Law Institute Climate Judiciary Project, wrote in a recent letter to The Wall Street Journal in response to criticism of the project.
The Washington, DC-based Environmental Law Institute (ELI) founded the Climate Judiciary Project (CJP) in 2018, making it the first of its kind to provide “reliable, timely information” on climate change litigation. according to the group. The scope of the project has expanded to several state and federal courts, including powerful appellate courts, and occurs in several cities and states file a high-profile lawsuit against the oil industry.
A review by Fox News Digital shows that several CJP lawyers and judges have close ties to the curriculum and are deeply involved in climate litigation.
According to NPR, people concerned about climate change are turning to “eco-chaplains” to deal with their concerns. (Barbara Alper/Getty Images)
Professor Michael Oppenheimer of Princeton University contributed to the CJP curriculum and presented “Evidence of Change: Judging Climate Litigation” with Sandra Nichols Thiam of CJP at the 2022 Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference on July 20, 2022.
Oppenheimer has a long history of filing climate-related filings amicus panties from 2019-2022 in lawsuits in several states.
Robin Kundis Craig, a professor at the University of Utah Law School, wrote a module for CJP in 2022 and has also filed several amicus briefs showing her active litigation practice.
An example occurred in 2023, when Craig was named on an order granting legal scholars’ request to file an amicus brief, which was signed by Judge Mark Recktenwald, who, according to Fox News Digital previously reportedquietly announced last year that he was presenting for an April course in conjunction with the Environmental Law Institute Climate Judiciary Project.
Recktenwald co-presented a CJP-sponsored National Judicial College webinar in December 2022, “Hurricanes in a Changing Climate and Related Litigation.” In 2023, he presented with Professor Robert DeConto at a National Judicial College seminar, “Rising Seas and Litigation: What Judges Need to Know about Warming-Driven Sea-Level Rise.”
President Ali pushed back on suggestions that his country was damaging the environment by claiming that Guyana has the lowest deforestation rate in the world. (Adobe Stock)
In October 2023, the Supreme Court of Hawaii in Recktenwald rejected an appeal of oil companies to file suit against climate disinformation in Honolulu.
Craig also filed an amicus brief in Hawaii state court in July 2022, where an order was signed by Judge Jeffrey Crabtree allowing the brief to be filed. Crabtree serves on the National Judicial College Curriculum Development Committee, which develops curricula for “Environmental law essential for the judiciary.”
‘Do not underestimate the importance of the role of judges in environmental law,’ the curriculum reads website states.
Ann Carlson, who joined the Biden administration in 2021served for years on ELI’s board of directors, while also “providing pro bono advice” to Sher Edling, an eco-law firm representing a number of jurisdictions, on lawsuits against oil companies, financial disclosures showed. Sher Edling attorney Michael Burger has also participated in multiple ELI events, and former Sher Edling attorney Meredith Wilensky was previously an ELI Public Interest Law Fellow.
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Burger is the executive director of the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law and an ELI presenter who has filed amicus briefs in support of plaintiffs in climate cases in the United States.
UCLA’s Emmett Institute on Climate Change and the Environment hosted a lecture in October 2017 with Vic Sher of Sher Edling: “Suing for climate change damages: the first wave of climate lawsuits.” Ann Carlson was the moderator for that discussion.
John Dernbach, listed as an expert on CJP’s website, filed an amicus brief in 2019 as part of a brief from legal scholars in support of the plaintiffs in City of Oakland v BP.
In this June 1, 2017, file photo, demonstrators gather outside the White House in Washington to protest President Trump’s decision to withdraw the United States from the Paris Climate Agreement. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)
“Judges who attend Climate Judiciary Project events are told they are walking into a left-wing lobbying shop,” Jason Isaac, president of the American Energy Institute, told Fox News Digital. “Under the guise of ‘judicial education,’ CJP uses activist academics to give a pro-plaintiff a taste of climate change lawsuits. This kind of politics underlines that the climate change lawsuits themselves are a left-wing attack on our quality of life.
“The Supreme Court will have the opportunity early next year to hear a case asking whether blue states and far-left mayors like Brandon Johnson can sue energy providers over climate change. Let’s hope the court takes the case and puts an end to the Green New Deal legislation. “
Fox News digital previously reported that since its inception more than five years ago, the project has developed 13 curriculum modules and organized 42 events, and more than 1,700 jury members have participated in the activities. And several judges serve as advisors to CJP, potentially impacting its curriculum and modules.
“So-called ‘climate change lawsuits,’ lawsuits claiming that private companies should be financially liable for damage to public infrastructure allegedly caused by climate change, have exploded in the past five years,” said Republican Senator Ted Cruz. wrote in a letter earlier this year at the Environmental Law Institute.
“To coincide with this unprecedented lawsuit, the Environmental Law Institute (ELI) launched a ‘first-of-its-kind effort’ to provide judges with ‘education on climate science, the impacts of climate change, and the ways in which climate science emerges’ in the law.” However, it appears that ELI’s goal in providing this ‘education’ may be to influence judges to side with plaintiffs in climate change cases.”
The letter went on to label Carlson as “one of the architects of the program” and asked for “information to enable the Committee to evaluate the efforts of both Ms. Carlson and ELI to influence the Federal Judiciary in adjudicating of climate disputes.”
Cruz claimed that “ELI wants to achieve through the courts what it cannot get into law: a radical environmental agenda.”
“To help judges make those ‘appropriate’ decisions, the Project has developed the ‘Climate Science and Law for Judges Curriculum’ (the Curriculum). Although ELI claims that the Project is “neutral” and “objective,” the Curriculum reads like a playbook for judges to rule in favor of plaintiffs in artificial climate change cases against traditional energy companies: it includes courses that “show how climate science is built on all long-standing scientific disciplines’ and ‘the human-induced component of (global warming)’ such as the ‘causal links between emissions’ and ‘changes in climate.’
Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, talks to reporters after House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., attended the Senate Republican luncheon at the U.S. Capitol on Nov. 1, 2023 (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
A report from the American Energy Institute earlier this year claims that CJP “is concealing its partnership with the plaintiffs because they know these ties create legal ethics issues.”
AEI says Sandra Nichols Thiam, ELI vice president and director of judicial education, acknowledged this in a 2023 press statement: “If we even appeared biased or if there was even a hint of bias, we would not be able to doing. what we are doing.”
“On balance, it appears that CJP has made the thinnest possible disclosures to give the appearance of righteousness,” AEI said. “But their confessions confirm that the CJP exists to facilitate informal, ex parte contacts between judges and climate activists under the guise of judicial education. And secrecy remains essential to their operation, whose purpose, as Thiam has said, is to create “a body of law that supports climate action.” ”
AEI, a group that describes itself as “dedicated to advancing policies that ensure America’s energy security and economic prosperity,” says CJP’s work is “an attack on the rule of law.”
Climate activists protest in Washington, DC (Fox News Digital)
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“In America, the powerful are not allowed to persuade and manipulate judges before their cases are heard,” the report said.
In a statement to Fox News Digital, an ELI spokesperson said: “CJP does not participate in legal proceedings, does not support or coordinate with any party in legal proceedings, and advises judges on how to rule in any case. Our courses provide judges with access to evidence -based information on climate science and trends in law.
“Experts in this field are of course welcome to lend their expertise to CJP programs while providing that same expertise separately and independently in another setting unrelated to the CJP program. It is routine and encouraged that judges participate in continuing education that exposes them to a wide range of disciplines.”
Fox News Digital’s Thomas Catenacci contributed to this report
