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Today, the Ninth Circuit delivered its ruling in Juliana v United States, the landmark climate case brought by 21 youth plaintiffs against the US government for violating their constitutional rights to a livable climate.
"What is remarkable about this decision, and what will land it in legal textbooks for decades to come, is that the Ninth Circuit recognizes the grave realities of the climate crisis and the government's role in causing climate harms, but immediately abdicates the court's own responsibility to address and remedy those harms," says Carroll Muffett, President of the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL).
The Ninth Circuit concluded that climate change is happening because of fossil fuel combustion and that the government has long understood the risks. "The record leaves little basis for denying that climate change is occurring at an increasingly rapid pace." The court recognized the "copious expert evidence" that "this unprecedented rise stems from fossil fuel combustion and will wreak havoc on the Earth's climate if unchecked," and "[a]bsent some action, the destabilizing climate will bury cities, spawn life-threatening natural disasters, and jeopardize critical food and water supplies."
"The record also establishes that the government's contribution to climate change is not simply a result of inaction," the court held. "The government affirmatively promotes fossil fuel use in a host of ways, including beneficial tax provisions, permits for imports and exports, subsidies for domestic and overseas projects, and leases for fuel extraction on federal land."
The Ninth Circuit held that the harms to youth plaintiffs in the case are sufficiently concrete and personal to be considered by the courts. It held that there is a clear causal chain between the plaintiffs' injuries and the government's actions. And it held that fossil fuels are the critical link in this chain. "The plaintiffs' alleged injuries are caused by carbon emissions from fossil fuel production, extraction, and transportation."
"Yet remarkably, having recognized the gravity of harms affecting these plaintiffs and the future generations that they represent, and the responsibility of the US government for causing those harms, the Ninth Circuit concludes that it is not the role of courts to remedy that injustice," says Muffett. "But for centuries, and emphatically, that has been the definition of the role of courts: when plaintiffs are suffering harms to fundamental rights at the hands of other branches of government, addressing those wrongs and protecting plaintiffs' rights is the essential and inescapable domain of the federal courts."
"Whether on issues of equality between genders or equality between races, courts have a long history of doing precisely what the panel says they cannot do here. Now, the entire Ninth Circuit will have the opportunity to either correct that error and make a history it can be proud of, or replicate it, and spend the decades to come as another grim reminder that courts too often perpetuate injustice rather than confront it."
Since 1989, the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL) has worked to strengthen and use international law and institutions to protect the environment, promote human health, and ensure a just and sustainable society.
Leaked audio reveals that the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas praised a far-right group whose president later attacked Justice Elena Kagan as "treasonous."
Leaked audio published Wednesday by the investigative outlets ProPublica and Documented reveals that the wife of U.S. Supreme Court Clarence Thomas effusively thanked a far-right group fighting judicial ethics reform effort spurred in large part by revelations about her husband's undisclosed gifts from Republican billionaires.
During a private July 31 call with the organization's top donors, First Liberty Institute president and CEO Kelly Shackelford read aloud an email—some of it in all-caps—from Ginni Thomas hailing the group's opposition to court reforms that are broadly popular with the U.S. public.
"YOU GUYS HAVE FILLED THE SAILS OF MANY JUDGES. CAN I JUST TELL YOU, THANK YOU SO, SO, SO MUCH," Ginni Thomas, who was closely involved in efforts to overturn the 2020 election, wrote to the group, according to Shackelford.
"I cannot adequately express enough appreciation for you guys pulling into reacting to the Biden effort on the Supreme Court," Thomas wrote.
Later in the call, First Liberty's president attacked liberal Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan as "treasonous" and "disloyal" for supporting an enforcement mechanism for the toothless ethics code that the high court unveiled under immense public pressure late last year.
Listen to the audio released by ProPublica and Documented:
The First Liberty Institute's donor call came days after Senate Finance Committee Chairman Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) uncovered additional billionaire-funded private travel that Justice Thomas failed to disclose, the latest in a string of scandalous revelations that began with ProPublicareporting last year.
ProPublicaestimates that Thomas—part of a right-wing Supreme Court supermajority that has overturned the constitutional right to abortion care and dramatically curtailed the power of federal regulatory agencies—has over the past three decades taken dozens of luxury vacations bankrolled by billionaire Harlan Crow and other GOP megadonors with interests before the court.
Survey data released shortly after ProPublica's first bombshell report in April 2023 found that a majority of U.S. voters at the time backed Supreme Court ethics reforms and wanted Thomas to resign from the nation's most powerful judicial body.
"Ginni Thomas isn't protecting the court. She's protecting her and her husband's bribes."
ProPublica noted that Shackelford held the First Liberty donor call "shortly after President Joe Biden had announced support for a slate of far-reaching Supreme Court changes," including term limits and a binding ethics code for justices.
"On the donor call, Shackelford voiced strong opposition to various court reform proposals, including the ones floated by Biden, as well as expanding the size of the court," the investigative outlets noted. "All of these proposals, Shackelford said, were part of 'a dangerous attempt to really destroy the court, the Supreme Court.' This effort was led by 'people in the progressive, extreme left' who were 'upset by just a few cases,' he said."
News of Ginni Thomas' support for First Liberty's efforts to combat Supreme Court ethics reforms was seen as further confirmation of the urgent need to overhaul the judicial body, whose favorability ratings are near historic lows.
"Ginni Thomas isn't protecting the court," progressive activist Melanie D'Arrigo wrote on social media. "She's protecting her and her husband's bribes."
"Israel kills 33 Palestinians in 24 hours but wants Palestinian families to think it's safe to travel to vaccinate their kids against polio," said one clinician.
United Nations agencies reiterated their calls for a cease-fire in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday after healthcare workers completed the first phase of a polio vaccination push in the face of relentless, deadly Israeli airstrikes.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director-general of the World Health Organization, announced early Wednesday that more than 187,000 children under the age of 10 were vaccinated during the first three days of the vaccination drive, an effort launched shortly after health officials detected the first polio case in the enclave in over two decades.
"Four fixed sites will continue to offer polio vaccination for the next three days in central Gaza to ensure no child is missed," said Tedros. "Preparations are underway today to roll out the vaccine campaign in south Gaza, which will start tomorrow. We are grateful for the dedication of all the families, health workers, and vaccinators who made this part of the campaign a success despite the dire conditions in the Gaza Strip."
"We ask for the humanitarian pauses to continue to be respected," he added. "We continue to call for a cease-fire."
The U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) echoed that message, writing on social media that "above all, we need a cease-fire now."
U.S.-armed Israeli forces have bombed the Gaza Strip throughout the dayslong vaccination drive, with one human rights monitor noting that some of the attacks "targeted locations near the vaccination centers."
Al Jazeerareported Wednesday that the Israeli military "targeted a home" in Gaza's Nuseirat refugee camp, killing at least one person. In Khan Younis, an Israeli airstrike "killed two more people, including a child," the outlet reported.
Gaza health officials said Tuesday that more than 30 people had been killed over the preceding 24-hour period.
" Israel kills 33 Palestinians in 24 hours but wants Palestinian families to think it's safe to travel to vaccinate their kids against polio," clinician and activist Annie Sparrow wrote on social media.
Health officials and aid workers risking their lives to vaccinate Gaza children against polio have said an enclave-wide inoculation campaign could only be successful with a sustained cease-fire deal, but Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is obstructing an agreement with hardline demands, including a continued Israeli military presence in the Palestinian territory.
The Washington Postnoted Tuesday that Netanyahu's insistence on Israeli control of the Philadelphi Corridor—a strip of land along Gaza's border with Egypt—"has also raised tensions with Egypt, which objects to any Israeli presence there and has warned that it violates the 1979 Israeli-Egypt peace treaty, a landmark agreement that has preserved peace between the two countries for more than four decades."
In the absence of a deal to end Israel's assault, humanitarian conditions on the ground in Gaza continue to deteriorate.
Tor Wennesland, the U.N.'s special coordinator for the Middle East peace process, said after returning from Gaza earlier this week that he "witnessed firsthand the catastrophic impact of the hostilities."
"The scale of destruction is immense, the humanitarian needs are colossal and soaring, and civilians continue to bear the brunt of this conflict. I unequivocally condemn the horrifying civilian death toll in Gaza," said Wennesland. "A deal is crucial to saving lives, reducing regional tensions, and enabling the U.N., in cooperation with the Palestinian Authority, to accelerate efforts to address the pressing needs of Gaza's population."
"The ongoing conflict has destroyed the lives of countless families," he added. "It must stop."
"We could, at any time, simply stop providing weapons to a far-right nationalist state intent on genocide. Instead, we just filed criminal charges against Palestinian militants who fought back," one professor lamented.
The U.S. Department of Justice on Tuesday unsealed terrorism and other criminal charges have been filed against half a dozen senior members of Hamas, the Palestinian resistance group that governs the Gaza Strip, and whose militant arm led the October 7 attacks on Israel.
The DOJ said in a
statement that the six individuals "are senior leaders of Hamas responsible for planning, supporting, and perpetrating Hamas' October 7 terrorist attacks in Israel resulting in the brutal murders of more than a thousand innocent civilians, including over 40 American citizens."
In announcing the charges, U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland said that "the Justice Department has charged Yahya Sinwar and other senior leaders of Hamas for financing, directing, and overseeing a decadeslong campaign to murder American citizens and endanger the national security of the United States."
"On October 7, Hamas terrorists, led by these defendants, murdered nearly 1,200 people, including over 40 Americans, and kidnapped hundreds of civilians," he continued. An unknown number of Israelis were killed by so-called "friendly fire" and under the Hannibal Directive, which allows Israeli forces to kill Israelis rather than let them fall into enemy hands.
"This weekend, we learned that Hamas murdered an additional six people they had kidnapped and held captive for nearly a year, including Hersh Goldberg-Polin, a 23-year-old Israeli American," Garland said. "We are investigating Hersh's murder, and each and every one of Hamas' brutal murders of Americans, as an act of terrorism."
"The charges unsealed today are just one part of our effort to target every aspect of Hamas' operations," he added. "These actions will not be our last."
International Criminal Court Prosecutor Karim Khan has applied for warrants to arrest Sinwar plus two other men charged on Tuesday: Ismail Haniyeh, the Hamas political leader assassinated in Tehran in July, and Mohammed Deif, who led the group's militant arm. Israel also claims to have killed Deif.
The men are wanted for alleged crimes including extermination and rape. Khan also wants to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant, his defense minister, for alleged crimes including extermination and forced starvation.
Israel is already on trial for genocide at the International Court of Justice. Israel’s obliteration of Gaza has left more than 145,000 Palestinians dead, wounded, or missing and millions more displaced, sick, and starving.
Despite this, the Biden administration continues to provide Israel with billions of dollars in weapons, diplomatic cover in the form of United Nations Security Council cease-fire resolution vetoes, and repeated genocide denials.
Responding to the new DOJ charges, Liam O'Mara, a history professor at Chapman University in California, said: "Our government doesn't want peace in Palestine. It never has. We could, at any time, simply stop providing weapons to a far-right nationalist state intent on genocide. Instead, we just filed criminal charges against Palestinian militants who fought back."