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Stark visuals tie extreme weather to fossil fuel industry, call for accountability
Fossil Free Media is launching a nationwide billboard campaign for their Make Polluters Pay campaign starting the week of August 5th. The campaign, in partnership with the Sunrise Movement, will feature billboards in California, New York, Arizona, and Philadelphia, with plans to expand to Florida and Louisiana in September.
Building on the success of last year's viral billboard campaign, this year's effort features even bolder visuals and messaging. The billboards feature dramatic images of climate disasters specific to each state, such as the Paradise fires in California and Hurricane Ida's impact in New York. Bold text overlays the images with phrases like "Brought to you by Big Oil" and "Superstorms: Sponsored by Big Oil."
The campaign aims to cut through the fossil fuel industry's carefully crafted public image and expose the direct link between their operations and the escalating climate crisis.
"Interestingly, when we tried to place billboards in Houston, Texas, we encountered significant resistance," said Cassidy DiPaola, Communications Director and spokesperson for the Make Polluters Pay campaign. "Billboard owners there weren't willing to work with us, citing concerns about upsetting their oil and gas industry clients. They even asked if we could make the message 'more positive' and avoid using the term 'Big Oil.' This pushback starkly illustrates the fossil fuel industry's influence and the fear they instill, even in the advertising world."
The Make Polluters Pay campaign is a national effort, championed by groups like Fossil Free Media, Sunrise Movement, Yellow Dot Studios, and Climate Power to hold the fossil fuel industry accountable for climate damages through legislation, lawsuits, and public pressure. The campaign simultaneously promotes state-level climate superfund bills and supports climate liability lawsuits against major oil and gas companies.
“Oil and gas companies are desperate. They see their public support imploding. They see a growing list of local and state governments suing them for climate change. Whether it's billboards or protests or TikToks, there is mounting pressure for politicians to take on Big Oil and fight for our generation to have a livable planet,” said Aru Shiney-Ajay, Executive Director, Sunrise Movement.
"For over half a century, Big Oil knew about the catastrophic consequences of burning fossil fuels," DiPaola said. "Instead of warning the public, they orchestrated a massive disinformation campaign, prioritizing profits over people and the planet. This willful deception has accelerated the climate crisis and extreme weather we're facing today, and it's past time they were held accountable."
Climate superfund bills would require fossil fuel companies to pay into dedicated funds for climate adaptation and resilience based on their historic greenhouse gas emissions. Meanwhile, climate liability lawsuits seek to recover billions in damages from oil and gas companies to fund critical resilience projects.
"We're attacking Big Oil's impunity from multiple angles," DiPaola explained. "Whether through superfund legislation or in the courts, our message is clear: it's time for polluters to pay for the damage they've caused."
The momentum for both strategies is building rapidly. Vermont became the first state to sign a climate superfund bill into law this May, with New York poised to follow suit after passing similar legislation through both chambers in June. On the litigation front, over a quarter of Americans are now represented in climate liability lawsuits against major oil and gas companies, with Puerto Rico becoming the latest jurisdiction to file suit in July.
“There is so much disinformation from Big Oil about extreme weather change and causes from fossil fuel pollution. Oil companies could take action but they like money. A lot. Unfortunately for them, we like the planet. A lot. So we're focused on fighting against them with satirical videos, funny billboards and anything else to hold them accountable for their constant pollution and lies," said Staci Roberts-Steele, Managing Director and Executive Producer, Yellow Dot Studios
The billboard campaign comes as Vice President Kamala Harris ramps up her presidential campaign, bringing renewed attention to her history of investigating fossil fuel companies as California's Attorney General.
"Vice President Harris has a track record of holding Big Oil accountable, from her time as California's AG to her calls for DOJ investigations on the campaign trail," DiPaola noted. "If elected president, she would have unprecedented power to make polluters pay for the damage they've caused."
Recent polling shows strong public support for making fossil fuel companies pay for climate damages. A Data for Progress/Fossil Free Media survey found that 66% of likely voters support laws requiring major oil and gas companies to pay a share of climate costs, with backing from 81% of Democrats and 61% of Independents.
The Make Polluters Pay billboard campaign aims to capitalize on this momentum and increase public pressure for accountability. Fossil Free Media plans to expand the campaign to additional states and explore other creative messaging tactics in the coming months.
Fossil Free Media is a nonprofit media lab that supports the movement to end fossil fuels and address the climate emergency.
"The majority of people in Britain abhor Robinson and the far right," says one joint statement. "We are the majority, they are the few."
From Birmingham, Brighton, and Bristol, to Liverpool, London, Newcastle, and Northampton, counterprotesters gathered across the United Kingdom on Wednesday to decry far-right riots and attacks against immigrants and Muslims.
Since the weekend, far-right protesters have targeted mosques, libraries, and even a hotel housing asylum-seekers—responding at least in part to online disinformation about the suspect in a deadly stabbing attack on a children's dance class. The demonstrations and expectations they would continue Wednesday evening drew anti-racists to the streets in several U.K. cities.
"The far right are spreading racism, Islamophobia, and hatred," says a Stand Up to Racism statement published in the Daily Mirror Wednesday and signed by actors, artists, drag performers, journalists, labor leaders, musicians, peace advocates, and members of Parliament—including Jeremy Corbyn, an Independent, along with Labour's Diane Abbott and Zarah Sultana.
The statement calls out far-right activist Tommy Robinson as well as political figures in the United Kingdom—including MP Nigel Farage of Reform U.K. and former Conservative Home Secretary Suella Braverman—and across Europe, emphasizing that "racism and Islamophobia in Parliament is leading to racism and Islamophobia on the streets."
Despite Labour's unpopularity under Prime Minister Keir Starmer, the party last month ended 14 years of Conservative rule at the national level with a landslide electoral victory. While Starmer has condemned the recent far-right riots, critics including Sultana have called on him and other British to explicitly denounce the attacks as Islamophobic.
"All those who oppose this must join in a united mass movement powerful enough to drive back the fascist. The majority of people in Britain abhor Robinson and the far right," the new joint statement says. We are the majority, they are the few. Britain has a proud history of defeating fascists and racists. We can defeat them again. We must Stand Up to Racism, Islamophobia, and antisemitism."
In response to such calls, as The Independentreported Wednesday, "up to 25,000 protesters, some chanting 'hate not welcome' and 'refugees welcome here,' gathered in towns and cities like Walthamstow, Finchley, Birmingham, Newcastle, and Blackpool as nearly 100 far-right rallies failed to materialize."
As Sky Newsdetailed:
In Birmingham, several hundred anti-racism protesters—some carrying signs such as "no place for hate" and "bigots out of Brum"—gathered outside a migrant center in the Jewellery Quarter.
A large group then marched into the center of the city, with no signs of any far-right groups in the area.
Meanwhile,
"counterprotesters are outnumbering anti-immigration protesters in Brighton tonight by about a hundred to one," and chanting, "Fascist scum, off our streets," according toBrighton and Hove News.
BBC Newsreported that "thousands of people gathered in Old Market in Bristol to counter a rumored anti-immigration rally," specifically, "claims on social media that protestors were planning to target an immigration lawyer's business premises."
"Bristol is a very vibrant and a welcoming city," a man who is originally from Gambia named Habib told the BBC. "Bristolians would not allow anybody to bring chaos into Bristol... I'm gonna join the Bristolians to stop what's going to happen tonight."
"Like the old saying goes—divided we fall, together we stand," he said. "I think standing here together tonight is very significant."
The crowd in Bristol chanted, "Say it out loud, say it clear, refugees are welcome here," a message repeated by signs carried in the English city and beyond it. Their posters and banners also forcefully denounced racism and fascism.
"In Liverpool they held banners such as 'Nans Against Nazis,' 'Immigrants welcome. Racists not,' and 'When the poor blame the poor only the rich win," The Guardianreported. "An elderly man with a portable speaker resting on his walking frame played John Lennon's 'Give Peace a Chance' on repeat."
In the city known as the birthplace of The Beatles, counterprotesters were protecting the Asylum Link building, according toThe Liverpool Echo. Addressing the crowd, Ewan Roberts, who manages the center thanked everyone for coming out "even when you weren't asked" and declared that "the people are stronger when they are united."
Counterprotesters came together in multiple locations across London, with some chanting, "When fascists attack, we fight back."
In Walthamstow, a town in an outer London borough, Clara Serra López told the BBC that "England wouldn't be anything without immigration."
"I'm here because I am an immigrant, a European immigrant, which comes with a lot of privilege," the demonstrator added. "It is quite an important time for white British and white immigrants to show up for the ones that might be really fearful to come here."
As ChronicleLivereported:
Thousands of people gathered in Newcastle's West End on Wednesday evening in a counterprotest in moving scenes outside The Beacon on Westgate Road. The crowd is estimated to have exceeded 3,000 as locals vowed to stand up to the far-right. Demonstrators held up signs reading "Geordies are of all colours" and "We love our West End".
One attendee of the counterdemonstration vowed: "This is a peaceful protest. We will defend our community."
"We were expecting big numbers of people, but you do have to see it to believe it. It makes me so happy to have seen so many here," Madina Mosque Imam Ali Asad, who attended the Newcastle demonstration, told the outlet. "It makes me happy to see the fact that this is beyond race or religion. It's about community."
In Northampton, footage shared on social media showed counterprotesters dancing on Kettering Road.
There were also demonstrations in cities including Sheffield and Southampton. In the latter, "around 50 far-right demonstrators turned up," according toThe Telegraph, "but their chants were drowned out by around 400 counterprotesters who sang 'there are many, many, many more of us than you.'"
"This is what Israelis rioted to protect, what the Knesset debated—the right to rape Palestinians," said one critic.
While human rights groups called for an investigation of a leaked recording apparently showing Israel Defense Forces reservists gang-raping a Palestinian detainee at the Sde Teiman military base and detention center, Israeli leaders including Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich on Wednesday also furiously demanded a probe of the video—not to seek justice for the victim, but rather to find and punish whoever leaked it.
Smotrich took to social media Wednesday to call for "an immediate criminal investigation to locate the leakers of the trending video that was intended to harm the reservists and that caused tremendous damage to Israel in the world, and to exhaust the full severity of the law against them."
Israeli media on Tuesday aired footage in which Israel Defense Forces (IDF) reservists are seen attacking a Palestinian man at Sde Teiman while trying to hide their actions with shields.
According to Israeli media reports, the victim was hospitalized with a severe anal injury, ruptured bowel, broken ribs, and lung damage.
Nine alleged assailants—who include members of Force 100, the military unit tasked with guarding Sde Teiman prisoners—were arrested last week in connection with the attack. A mob of far-right Israelis including senior government officials subsequently stormed two military bases in an attempt to free the suspects.
While many Israelis condemned the alleged rape, others rallied around the accused reservists. Smotrich described them as "heroic warriors." National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir called them "our best heroes."
Far-right Israeli lawmaker Zvi Sukkot—who took part in last week's riot—joined Smotrich in demanding an investigation of the video leak.
"Leaking and disclosure of investigative materials is a criminal offense that harms the proper legal process, the rule of law, public trust, and the principle of justice," he said Wednesday.
Israeli media reported Wednesday that two of the accused reservists lied on polygraph tests when asked if they had sodomized the prisoner.
Numerous Israelis continued to express support for the accused rapists. Israel Today political reporter Yehuda Schlesinger said Wednesday on a popular morning show that "I don't give a rat's ass what they do to Hamas man."
"The only thing that is a problem for me here is that it's not a regulated policy of the state to abuse the detainees, because, first of all, they deserve it, and it's great revenge... maybe it will serve us a little more a a deterrent..."
Genocidal psycho Yehuda Schlesinger,… https://t.co/hWpsD4VU3q pic.twitter.com/YH6G0kSvs3
— B.M. (@ireallyhateyou) August 7, 2024
"First of all, they deserve it," Schlesinger said of the abuse at Sde Teiman and other Israeli military prisons. "It's great revenge that we need to give them."
"It's just a shame that we don't do it in an institutionalized way, as part of regulations for torture of prisoners," he added, "because then the next guys who think about doing another October 7 will say, 'Do you see what they're doing to [us] in Israel?'"
Etan Nechin, the New York correspondent for the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, accused the media of being the "main culprit" that "has normalized the most extreme voices, letting genocidal brutes, racists, and messianic zealots into Israeli's TV sets."
Some American media critics drew attention to the scant coverage of abuse at Sde Teiman in the U.S. corporate media.
"U.S. taxpayers continue to support this military and its torture camps," Palestinian American author and political analyst Yousef Munayyer wrote on social media. "How is this not front-page news?"
In the United States—which supports Israel's war on Gaza with billions of dollars in military aid and diplomatic cover—State Department Spokesperson Matthew Miller said during a Wednesday press conference that "there ought to be zero tolerance for sexual abuse, rape of any detainee. Period."
"It is appropriate that the IDF in this case, has announced an investigation, has arrested a number of people who are alleged to have been involved, and I won't speak to the outcome of that investigation, but it ought to proceed swiftly," Miller added.
Critics noted the IDF's chronic failures to credibly investigate its alleged crimes. The Israeli rights group Yesh Din said in late 2022 that less than 1% of Israeli soldiers accused of harming Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza were indicted over the previous five years.
The Israeli Supreme Court on Wednesday took up a petition by rights groups seeking to close Sde Teiman, where widespread—and sometimes deadly—torture has been reported. Last month, Israel's High Court issued a conditional order seeking to shut down the prison in response to the flood of reports of torture there.
Former prisoners including children and Israeli whistleblowers at Sde Teiman—often called "Israel's Guantánamo Bay"—have described rampant torture and abuse at the facility, which is used to imprison Palestinians captured in the Gaza Strip. According to their testimonies, prisoners have been raped, electrocuted, mauled by dogs, burned with cigarettes, severely beaten, starved, and subjected to 24-hour shackling sometimes leading to amputations.
The Israeli human rights group B'Tselem
said this week that at least 60 Palestinians have died in Israeli custody since October.
More than 1,100 Israelis and others died during the Hamas-led attack on October 7, during which more than 240 other people were kidnapped. Israel's response—which is the subject of an International Court of Justice genocide case—has left more than 142,000 Palestinians dead, maimed, or missing, according to local and international officials.
Smotrich suggested earlier this week that it is "moral and justified" to starve 2 million Palestinians to death. So far, at least dozens, mostly children, have died from malnutrition, dehydration, and lack of medical care in Gaza amid Israel's crippling assault and siege.
"We have had an unprecedented act by a government official to pull back what was a valid agreement," said an attorney representing tortured 9/11 suspects imprisoned at Guantánamo Bay.
Attorneys representing alleged 9/11 planners imprisoned at Guantánamo Bay argued Wednesday that U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin's move to block plea deals for three defendants violated Pentagon rules and belied the corruption of the military commission system established during the George W. Bush administration.
"We have had an unprecedented act by a government official to pull back what was a valid agreement," Walter Ruiz, who represents defendant Mustafa al-Hawsawi, said at a hearing at Guantánamo, according toCNN.
"For us, it raises very serious questions about continuing to engage in a system that seems so obviously corrupt and rigged," Ruiz added.
Last week, the Department of Defense announced that Brig. Gen. Susan Escallier, the convening authority for the Guantánamo military commissions, "has entered into pretrial agreements" with al-Hawsawi, alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and Walid bin Attash.
The long-anticipated agreement—under which the three men would be spared execution by pleading guilty—came amid years of stalled legal proceedings in a case complicated by the U.S.' torture of the defendants and government efforts to cover it up.
While welcomed by advocates of closing the prison and some victims' families, Escallier's move also sparked a firestorm of criticism from numerous U.S. lawmakers, 9/11 first responders, and victims' relatives.
Last Friday, Austin withdrew the plea agreements. Speaking at a press conference on Tuesday, he explained that he has "long believed that the families of the victims, our service members, and the American public deserves the opportunity to see military commission trials carried out in his case."
"I'm deeply mindful of my duty to all those whose lives were lost or changed forever on 9/11, and I fully understand that no measure of justice can ever make up for their loss," Austin added. "So this wasn't a decision that I took lightly."
Eugene Fidell, a military law professor at Yale University and co-founder of the National Institute of Military Justice, told CNN that Austin's move "was illegal."
According to the network:
One of the primary issues pointed to on Wednesday by defense counsel was a regulation laid out in the military's Manual for Military Commissions, which says the convening authority can withdraw a pretrial agreement before the accused begins "performance of promises" or if the accused does not hold up their end of the deal. Gary Sowards, a defense attorney for Mohammad, said in court that Austin did not have authority under that regulation because his client had "begun very important, substantive, specific performance.'"
Sowards acknowledged that motions for discovery on the issue of potential unlawful influence by Austin, which would "seek to explore how he was coerced and influenced," could take a year or two to litigate. But the issue of the Manual for Military Commissions regulation is "a simple reading of about 12 lines of text," he said, and a decision on it should be able to be expedited.
Prosecutor Clayton Trivett Jr. told the commission Wednesday that the government needed to "work through the issues raised in these motions" so that the prosecution's position can be "fully articulated."
Sowards retorted, "'We want to consult with people'—that sounds like, 'We want to get our stories together.'"
Some legal experts doubted whether the government would ever be able to try, let alone convict, the 9/11 suspects. Military judges and prosecutors have cited defendants' torture in declining to proceed with cases against them. Many men and boys were tortured at CIA "black sites," Guantánamo, and military prisons including Abu Ghraib. At least dozens of detainees died.
Wells Dixon, a lawyer with the Center for Constitutional Rights who represented convicted terrorist Majid Khan, told CNN that the prosecution's unwillingness "to allow evidence about the defendants' torture and abuse to be aired in court" will make it extremely difficult to secure death sentences for the men.
"If Secretary Austin says that a 9/11 case is going to proceed to trial, and a verdict, and possibly a sentencing, then he is either hopelessly ill-informed or is lying to victims' family members," he added.
Accusations of military commission corruption go back decades.
In 2004, three military prosecutors—Maj. Robert Preston, Capt. John Carr, and Capt. Carrie Wolf—requested transfers from the commissions after concluding they were rigged.
"They were told by the chief prosecutor at the time that they didn't need evidence to get convictions," Clive Stafford Smith, an attorney who represented more than 70 Guantánamo detainees, toldThe Nation in 2008.
That year, former Guantánamo chief prosecutor Col. Morris Davis said that then-Pentagon General Counsel William Haynes told him that "we can't have acquittals."
Atlantic staff writer Graeme Wood asserted this week that "there is a way to clean up this mess."
"Now that Austin has assumed the power of the convening authority, he can restore the agreement he tore up on Friday—to reverse the reversal and bring these sordid proceedings to the end they were until recently already destined for," he wrote. "If he instead wants to extend the life of the commissions, slouching toward a trial that will never happen, then the pointless sacrifice of money and time will continue."
"For the families in search of finality, each minute of delay is a minute stolen, and for the defendants, each is a minute gained," Wood added. "The defendants have already cheated the hangman. The best way to end their run is to take that bitter deal, and bring these commissions to a well-deserved end."