AGs request probe into climate activists’ influence on Federal Judicial Center

By Tate Miller
The Center Square

Twenty-two state attorneys general sent a letter to chairmen of the House and Senate Judiciary Committee, requesting that an investigation concerning improper influence on judges be expanded to include the Federal Judicial Center’s manual that the attorney generals say has been influenced by climate activists and diversity, equity and inclusion ideology.

Leading the charge of attorney generals is Nebraska AG Mike Hilgers, who told The Center Square: “The Federal Judicial Center’s new science manual should present complex evidence fairly and impartially to judges, but instead it appears to embed the views of climate activists and diversity, equity, and inclusion ideologues into what is presented as neutral guidance.”

“I joined my colleagues in urging Chairman Jordan, Chairman Issa, and the House Judiciary Committee to expand their investigation into the Federal Judicial Center’s climate science chapter and its embrace of ideological policies,” Hilgers said.

For reference, the House Judiciary Committee recently opened an investigation into whether a climate law group “is improperly influencing federal judges on environment-related cases.”

Hilgers told The Center Square: “When the same advocates and experts who are actively litigating climate cases help write and review a chapter that will be used by federal judges behind the scenes, it raises obvious and serious concerns about impartiality of the judicial system.”

“Nebraskans, and all Americans, deserve courts that are neutral and fair,” Hilgers said.

The other 21 signers of the letter to House and Senate Judiciary Committee Chairmen Jim Jordan, Chuck Grassley, and Darrell Issa include the attorneys general from Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, West Virginia and Wyoming.

Neither Jordan, Senator Chuck Grassley nor Issa responded to The Center Square’s requests for comment by the time of publishing.

CEO of the American Energy Institute Jason Isaac informed The Center Square how the “House Judiciary is already investigating efforts to improperly influence federal judges,” and said that “the Federal Judicial Center now sits squarely within that scope.”

“The FJC used taxpayer dollars to publish a reference manual that embeds disputed, plaintiff-driven climate alarmist theories into materials judges consult,” Isaac said.

“That is not education, it is outcome-shaping, and it directly undermines judicial impartiality,” Isaac said.

“Congress has both the authority and the obligation to examine how this happened and to put guardrails in place before trust in the courts is further eroded,” Isaac said.

Consumer advocacy organizations also weighed in on the letter, with director of Consumers’ Research Will Hild telling The Center Square: “I commend these attorneys general for not allowing the left to rewrite the rules and force their climate agenda on everyday Americans.”

“Attempts by climate activists to inject politics into a supposedly impartial judicial manual is nothing more than woke activism masquerading as ‘science,’” Hild said.

Similarly, executive director of consumer protection group Alliance for Consumers O.H. Skinner told The Center Square that his organization “commends the Attorneys General for calling for this investigation and fighting back against the woke lawfare campaign that attempts to mandate Progressive Lifestyle Choices via judicial activism – driving popular products off the shelf and raising prices for consumers.”

“This is the woke lawfare playbook in action,” Skinner said. “They see courtrooms as the best chance to usher in a leftwing ideology that could never pass at the ballot box or in legislative chambers.”

President of Public Policy Solutions and former domestic policy advisor to President Donald Trump Joe Grogan told The Center Square that “the House Judiciary Committee must add the Federal Judiciary Center to its investigation of entities working to twist America’s legal system to enact a radical, climate action agenda.”

“By allowing climate activists and, worse, climate litigators to take the pen on a document that is intended to provide impartial guidance to judges who decide the very cases they try, the Federal Judiciary Center has undermined faith and confidence in yet another institution,” Grogan said.

In their letter, the 22 attorney generals outlined their concern that a climate agenda influenced the Federal Judicial Center’s manual, as well as diversity, equity and inclusion ideology.

“Start with who wrote the climate change chapter,” the letter stated. “Co-author Jessica Wentz is a climate change advocate at Columbia Law School’s Sabin Center for Climate Change Law.”

The letter stated that Michael Burger reviewed the climate chapter; Burger is known for representing the City of Honolulu in its lawsuit against energy companies, trying to make them liable for climate change.

Additionally, the letter explained that the manual “advances diversity, equity, and inclusion principles” and “advocates for more ‘equitable’ outcomes.”

“In the chapter on medical testimony, the manual reports that ‘social and economic inequities’ have caused America’s healthcare system to have ‘substantial disparities by race/ethnicity, but also by “socioeconomic status, age, geography, language, gender, disability status, citizenship status, and sexual identity and orientation,”’” the letter said.