By Jason Isaacs
September 19, 2024
Left-wing legal influence groups find the spotlight unwelcome.
The Environmental Law Institute’s Climate Justice Project (CJP) bills itself as an objective resource for judges interested in climate change issues and has held “educational” events for more than 2,000 judges. My organization, the American Energy Institute, recently exposed many of CJP’s ties to left-wing climate plaintiffs who are pushing Green New Deal-type policies with lawsuits.
After treatment in major news pieces and prominent editorials, Environmental Law Institute president Jordan Diamond recently responded with a non-sequitur in The Wall Street Journal.
This important fact cannot be disputed in Mr. Diamond’s letter: CJP took millions of dollars from the same entity that withdrew the climate change case against the energy provider. The activist academics who make up the CJP program also advise climate plaintiffs on their side or support them in amicus submissions. And the “educational material” itself is heavily biased against the climate plaintiffs, in fact stating that the defendants vigorously objected in dozens of cases.
There is no answer – indeed it is irrelevant – to note as Mr Diamond does that the CJP does not “participate in court” or “advise judges how they should rule in any case.” CJP is more subtle by design. This is a left-wing group that exists for legal environmental conditions so that climate change lawsuits receive a more favorable hearing. CJP achieves policy objectives without weight and clarity.
And CJP’s goal is to produce policy change. They said that. Sandra Nichols Thiem, ELI’s director of judicial education, said in 2022 that the CJP’s goal is to help create “a legal body that supports climate action.”
Honolulu’s climate change lawsuit against energy providers is a good example of ELI and CJP at work.
ELI personnel apparently helped settle the lawsuit. Emails show that ELI board member Ann Carlson used discretionary funds to pay for a trip to the 2019 conference to “encourage Hawaii to consider a nuisance lawsuit” against the energy provider. Carlson spoke at the conference alongside Vic Sher, a trial attorney who has represented two dozen state and municipal entities in climate change lawsuits. Finally the city and county of Honolulu responded to this call to action, filing a harassment lawsuit against the provider in 2020. Who did Honolulu enlist to represent them? It will be Vic Sher.
Honolulu had hopes of success, as ELI’s good friend held the highest judicial post in the land. Mark Recktenwald, chief justice of the Hawaii state Supreme Court, is an ELI ally who has presented at least three times to the group on sea level rise and climate change litigation in general. The Honolulu lawsuit reaches the state supreme court in 2023. And Recktenwald wrote the decision allowing the Honolulu lawsuit to proceed. The energy provider appealed Recktenwald’s decision to the US Supreme Court.
That’s the situation at work. Will ELI and CJP be bold enough to join the court or tell the judge how to rule? Of course not. Instead, he quietly manipulates the environment – leading the right people to the right places or equipping the judge with the information he chooses – so that his preferred outcome can be guaranteed.
The U.S. Supreme Court may interfere with the plan. The energy provider returned to the U.S. Supreme Court in February after the Recktenwald ruling, asking the judge to dismiss the lawsuit brought by Honolulu. We will find that the high court will hear the case in early 2025.
It is understandable that ELI and CJP wanted to keep the nature of their operation under wraps while the appeal was pending. But no one should know about the Climate Justice Project. This is a results-oriented operation, whatever Mr. Diamond says in the unwanted spotlight.
The Honorable Jason Isaac is the CEO of the American Energy Institute and its sister trade association representing American energy producers who unapologetically support the free market and free American energy. He previously served four terms in the Texas House of Representatives.
This article was originally published by RealClearEnergy and is available via RealClearWire.
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