Judges and the Climate Tort Lobby

The next frontier for the plaintiffs bar is the climate tort—blaming business for harm from hotter weather. To that end environmentalists and plaintiff lawyers are sharing information on training for federal judges.

The House Judiciary Committee is investigating this cooperation, and on Friday it subpoenaed tort lawyer Roger Worthington for information on his law firm’s access to judicial training materials before they were published as a module for federal judges by the Climate Judiciary Project (CJP).

Judiciary sent the subpoena after Mr. Worthington's lawyer said his client wouldn't voluntarily appear for a transcribed interview, according to a letter to Mr. Worthington from committee Chairman Jim Jordan and subcommittee Chair Darrell Issa. He's asked to appear for a June 4 deposition.

Mr. Worthington's firm, Worthington & Caron, has filed a lawsuit for Multnomah County in Oregon against fossil-fuel companies. It claims the firms were responsible for carbon emissions that allegedly contributed to the 2021 Pacific Northwest Heat Dome, when weather was unusually hot. That's right. The county is seeking more than $50 billion in damages for a heat wave.

In the months leading up to the case, Mr. Worthington was in contact with Michael Wehner, a climate researcher at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Mr. Wehner has worked with the Climate Judiciary Project and the Environmental Law Institute (ELI) that play an active role in training judges.

In spring 2023, Mr. Wehner sent Mr. Worthington a draft of a training module for judges he was writing for CJP. In January the Judiciary Committee asked Mr. Worthington why "an apparent pre-publication version of the same training module has been hosted on the website of your firm?"

Mr. Worthington's lawyer, Andrew Herman, acknowledged that the law firm "received the . . . draft module on attribution of climate change from Dr. Michael J. Wehner who co-authored the module as an expert associated with ELI." The letter says the "law firm used this material, titled 'Drawing the Causal Chain: The Detection and Attribution of Climate Change,' as part of its due diligence to develop and assess the basis for investigating a potential legal claim against oil and gas companies."

Mr. Herman adds that the Worthington firm "has no knowledge or information relating to the allegations of 'improper attempts . . . to influence federal judges.'" But then why is the creator of training material for judges sharing a draft copy with a plaintiffs lawyer prosecuting a huge climate case?

CJP says that since 2018 it has created 15 curriculum modules by 24 authors and had more than 2,000 judges participate in its climate training. The Center doesn't publish which judges attend its climate education sessions. A source familiar with the investigation says the committee has identified at least 130 federal judges who attended CJP judicial training events or webinars in six years.

The testimonials from judges on the CJP website are anonymous. If there's no conflict of interest and it’s all neutral science education, why not publish their names?

Read the full article here.