By George Landrith
Wednesday, 04 March 2026 06:15 AM EST
The end of the Biden administration marked the end of an era. The long effort to center climate change as the organizing principle for Democratic energy and economic policy collapsed under the weight of inflation, polarization, and proceduralism.
It turns out you can’t forcibly transition the world off fossil fuels without imposing costs that are unacceptable to the public. Americans noticed and responded by electing leaders who prioritize energy policies that enable economic growth and bolster national security.
Yet while voters rejected climate extremism at the ballot box, the climate activist movement didn’t abandon its agenda—it simply changed venues. After repeatedly failing in the policy arena, climate activists have shifted their strategy from democracy to lawfare. Rather than persuading the public, they are now attempting to capture the judiciary.
Their objective is no secret: use courts to impose sweeping climate liability on oil and gas producers under novel and legally dubious theories that Congress has never approved and voters have never endorsed. These lawsuits aim to transfer the costs of natural disasters onto fossil fuel producers, despite the absence of any conclusive science that attributes specific weather events—or precise damages—to the conduct of particular companies.
That campaign now runs through the Environmental Law Institute (ELI) and its so-called Climate Judiciary Project (CJP). ELI markets CJP as a neutral educational effort for judges. In reality, congressional investigators, watchdog groups, and public reporting have documented something very different: a coordinated effort to influence judges who may preside over climate damage lawsuits by priming them with plaintiff-aligned science, legal theories, and “expert” opinions.
The U.S. House Judiciary Committee is now formally investigating whether ELI and CJP are improperly biasing judges toward climate plaintiffs, in violation of long-standing judicial ethics rules. CJP’s materials are curated by activist professors and lawyers who are themselves deeply entangled in climate litigation. Many have served as amicus signatories, advisers, or public advocates for the very lawsuits judges are being asked to decide.
These are academics who publicly support climate liability theories, coordinate with plaintiffs’ firms, or advocate for bankrupting energy companies—yet are presented to judges as neutral experts. Gary Yohe, who authored CJP’s “Risks and Costs of Climate Change” module, has advocated for active climate litigation against fossil-fuel companies, including signing an open letter urging Connecticut officials to pursue ExxonMobil in court.
Ann Carlson, who served on CJP’s advisory curriculum committee, coordinated with dark-money networks and allied environmental groups to seed and support climate nuisance lawsuits while also helping recruit plaintiffs for Sher Edling LLP, the plaintiffs’ firm driving many of these cases. Michael Oppenheimer, a curriculum advisor for CJP, has filed amicus briefs in support of climate plaintiffs in several cases across the country, including in Baltimore, Delaware, Oakland, and Rhode Island.
Jessica Wentz, a senior fellow at the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law and author of CJP’s “Government Action and Climate Science” module, supported Greenpeace in a petition to the Commission on Human Rights of the Philippines to investigate and sanction major energy companies for alleged climate harms. These same individuals author CJP curriculum modules explicitly designed to advance disputed legal positions—downplaying the political question doctrine, endorsing speculative attribution science, and promoting the social cost of carbon as a damages metric—all positions actively litigated by climate plaintiffs.
Compounding the concern, ELI and CJP have deliberately targeted judges in jurisdictions where climate lawsuits are pending or anticipated while concealing the identities of participating judges and the funding sources underwriting these programs. As ELI insiders have acknowledged, even the appearance of bias would undermine what they are trying to accomplish—namely, shaping “a body of law that supports climate action,” not impartially applying existing law. Rigging the game for plaintiffs behind closed doors is activism, not education.
This trend is incompatible with the energy-dominance agenda Americans voted for. Climate nuisance and damages lawsuits seek tens of billions of dollars from American energy producers. If successful, they would raise energy prices, undermine domestic production, and hand strategic leverage to foreign adversaries who do not share our environmental standards or national interests. Even a handful of favorable rulings could distort energy markets nationwide and effectively impose a Green New Deal through judicial decree.
If climate activists were confident that their arguments against fossil fuels rested on solid science, clear causation, and established law, they would present them openly in court. Instead, they are working behind the scenes to shape judicial outcomes outside the adversarial process.
