Rhode Island Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, top Democrat on the Environment and Public Works Committee, is asking the policymaking body of the federal courts to counter what he calls a “dangerous” climate-denial effort aimed at influencing judges.
In a letter last Tuesday, Whitehouse urged the Judicial Conference of the United States to replace a climate science chapter that was removed from a judicial training manual after Republicans complained it was biased against fossil fuel companies.
And Whitehouse — who is also top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Federal Courts — urged the body to impose stricter rules on judicial attendance at “educational” junkets.
“The attack on the science chapter and the junkets propagating ‘alternative’ science share the same goal: convincing judges of the false narrative that billionaire-funded climate denial is simply a competing view that merits equal time to legitimate, evidence-backed climate science,” Whitehouse wrote. “It’s not; it’s false, and I am not aware of any court decision anywhere that says otherwise.”
