AGs urge removal of climate science section from National Academies’ manual

By Tate Miller
The Center Square

Following the victory of removing a climate chapter from the Federal Judicial Center’s manual, 21 state attorney generals are urging the National Academy of Sciences to remove a climate science section from the academies’ manual, expressing their concern over tax money promoting various partisan ideology in the organization.

Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen – who is leading the charge of his 20 fellows – told The Center Square: “It is unacceptable that the National Academies continue to allow the climate science chapter to remain in circulation, especially when taxpayer dollars are used to support their work.

“When biased theories are presented to judges as fact and neutral reference tools, it compromises judicial impartiality and can tip the scale on pending litigation,” Knudsen said.

“I expect a clear explanation for why it has not been withdrawn and how they plan to prevent biased ideologies in future editions,” Knudsen said.

Knudsen was joined by attorney generals from Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, West Virginia, and Wyoming in sending a letter to the National Academy of Sciences (NAS).

The attorney generals wrote to NAS President Marcia McNutt and NAS President-Elect Neil H. Shubin that the climate agenda found in the manual as well as the organization’s general promotion of DEI and left-wing ideology is “especially troubling since taxpayer money provided by the federal government is the largest source – more than $200 million – of the National Academies’ budget,”

“Taxpayer money should not be used for political causes, particularly by an entity that Congress created to provide independent and objective scientific reports,” the attorney generals wrote.

The NAS was founded in the 1860s to “advise the government on issues related to science and technology.”

NAS has not yet responded to The Center Square’s request for comment.

Executive director of consumer advocacy group Consumers’ Research Will Hild told The Center Square that “taxpayer dollars should not be used by the National Academy of Sciences to push a woke agenda, yet that is exactly what the organization is doing.”

“The Academy has gone all in on the woke agenda by promoting radical climate policies, hosting DEI workshops, pushing implicit-bias ideology into the legal system, and even publishing guidance that treats the First Amendment as an obstacle to censoring speech it dislikes,” Hild noted, as the attorney generals’ letter likewise did.

“That is not objective science; it is woke politics funded by taxpayers,” Hild stated.

Hild said that “Consumers’ Research applauds the Attorneys General for demanding that the National Academy of Sciences pull this biased climate chapter and stop using taxpayer resources to push a radical political agenda.”

“We will continue to support elected officials who push back against woke politics and protect consumers,” Hild said.

This letter comes on the heels of a similar letter sent by 22 state attorney generals to chairmen of the House and Senate Judiciary Committee, requesting a probe into climate activists’ influence on the Federal Judicial Center’s science manual.

The climate chapter was removed; however. CEO of the American Energy Institute Jason Isaac told The Center Square that “the Federal Judicial Center’s decision to ‘omit’ the climate chapter is not the same as rescinding it.”

“The full guide remains publicly hosted by the National Academies under the FJC’s name, and the activist framing embedded throughout the Manual has not been removed,” Isaac said.

“Judicial education must explain scientific method, not normalize litigation strategies or launder contested theories as settled fact,” Isaac said.