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people vs fossil fuels
250+ Groups Call On Biden DOJ to Drop Fight Against Children's Climate Case
"Young Americans have the right to be heard by our nation's courts, the branch of our government that has a duty to protect our constitutional right to a livable planet."
Jun 21, 2023
Representing a coalition of more than 255 climate justice and other progressive groups as well as more than 50,000 supporters, campaigners on Wednesday digitally delivered a petition demanding the U.S. Department of Justice end its efforts to block a lawsuit filed eight years ago by 21 youth plaintiffs over the harm done to children across the country by the government's continued support for fossil fuels.
The People vs. Fossil Fuels coalition—including Food & Water Watch, Sunrise Movement, and 350.org—delivered the petition to the DOJ and Attorney General Merrick Garland, with coalition steering committee member John Beard saying the young plaintiffs in Juliana v. United States "have the right to be heard by their nation's courts."
"Justice deferred, regardless of age, is justice DENIED," said Beard. "End the DOJ's campaign to deny these youth access to justice."
The case was originally filed in 2015, with the plaintiffs arguing that the U.S. government has not done enough to protect communities from the climate crisis and that its continued support for planet-heating fossil fuel extraction is putting the lives of millions of children in danger.
Since the lawsuit was originally filed, the petition delivered on Wednesday points out, "young people like these 21 young Americans have suffered from increasingly severe climate harms" as their day in court has been "delayed again and again by tactics employed by the Department of Justice to impede or dismiss their case."
"Justice deferred, regardless of age, is justice DENIED. End the DOJ's campaign to deny these youth access to justice."
Since the plaintiffs—now ranging in age from 15 to 26—filed their lawsuit, the U.S. has faced climate-related disasters including a deadly heatwave in the Pacific Northwest, a number of severe hurricanes, and a drought across the western part of the country.
"Young people fear when the next devastating flood, wildfire, drought, heatwave, or other climate disaster will be," said Zanagee Artis, founder and executive director of Zero Hour, who co-delivered the petition with Beard. "It's long past time for the Department of Justice to end its opposition to the Juliana plaintiffs and youth climate justice. Young Americans have the right to be heard by our nation's courts, the branch of our government that has a duty to protect our constitutional right to a livable planet."
The campaigners delivered the petition three weeks after Judge Ann Aiken of the U.S. District Court for the District of Oregon ruled that the plaintiffs can amend their complaint and the case can proceed to trial. In 2018 U.S. the Supreme Court halted to case from going to trial days before it was to commence.
"It is a foundational doctrine that when government conduct catastrophically harms American citizens, the judiciary is constitutionally required to perform its independent role and determine whether the challenged conduct, not exclusively committed to any branch by the Constitution, is unconstitutional," said Aiken in her ruling earlier this month.
Now, "evidence that indisputably proves the federal government's knowing perpetuation of the climate crisis will come to light, in open court, and Judge Aiken will rule whether the U.S. energy system violates the youth's constitutional rights," People vs. Fossil Fuels said Wednesday.
The coalition called on the DOJ to refrain from using an "extreme legal tool" known as a petition for writ of mandamus to delay the case. The Trump administration used the maneuver six times to block legal actions, but the tool is "only intended to be used as an 'extraordinary remedy,'" according to Our Children's Trust, the public interest law firm that represents the plaintiffs in Juliana.
"Tell Attorney General Garland today to end the extreme legacy of the Trump DOJ by not filing an unprecedented SEVENTH petition for writ of mandamus in this case in an attempt to once again delay this trial," said Children's Trust this month, calling the legal tool an "abuse of process."
The petition was delivered on the same day that another case regarding children and fossil fuel energy wrapped up in Montana. Sixteen plaintiffs ranging in age from 5 to 22—also represented by Our Children's Trust—are arguing in that case that the state's continued support for fossil fuel extraction has violated the children's constitutional rights.
People vs. Fossil Fuels urged supporters to write to the DOJ to call on Garland to end the Biden administration's opposition to the case.
"The U.S. District Court has just put the young plaintiffs' case back on a path to trial and the Department of Justice will soon respond," said the coalition. "They can choose to defend the case on its merits at trial—just as they would any other constitutional case—or continue the Trump administration strategy of seeking to block the youth's access to their own courts."
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The Climate Crisis Canceled Our Climate Rally
With NYC suffering the world’s worst air quality due to smoke billowing from Canada’s unabated wildfires, there was no way we could gather people to chant and sing.
Jun 09, 2023
Thursday afternoon I was scheduled to keynote a climate rally in NYC to hold the fossil fuel industry accountable for our burning planet and soaring energy bills. Despite New York State’s ambitious climate law, the fossil fuel industry is fighting climate action every step of the way. They are refusing to adhere to our climate law’s targets, working to weaken them, and sowing misinformation, all while asking for dramatic rate increases.
So, led by People vs. Fossil Fuels, we decided to take to the streets and highlight the need to enforce our climate law, shut down dirty power plants, and dismantle fossil fuel infrastructure. We planned a forceful but joyful teach-in and art action featuring stickers, screen printing, and a giant story book.
But with the climate crisis causing NYC to suffer the world’s worst air quality due to smoke billowing from Canada’s unabated wildfires, there was no way we could gather people to chant and sing. The danger to our health is too great. We had to cancel. The climate crisis canceled our climate rally.
New York City’s skies are glowing a hazy apocalyptic orange. We now need to wear our masks outdoors too. What else must we experience before waking up to the fact that the climate crisis is upon us, now, in NYC?
While this irony is frustrating, the real tragedy is the ongoing public health emergency that the poor air quality is causing. Pollution and the related health disparities in New York have taken many lives due to Covid-19, disproportionately impacting communities of color. The same people, those with pre-existing conditions, children, the elderly, essential workers who can’t shelter inside—are bearing the brunt of this poor air quality. The same people are paying too much for the very energy that is harming their health. This environmental justice is caused by fossil fuels.
New York City’s skies are glowing a hazy apocalyptic orange. We now need to wear our masks outdoors too. What else must we experience before waking up to the fact that the climate crisis is upon us, now, in NYC?
We have the tools to address this. Our state laws and climate plan demand that we phase out fossil fuels, shut down power plants, downsize fossil fuel infrastructure, and move away from combustion.
We will reschedule our rally and we won’t stop fighting for the plain and simple truth—we need air to breathe, and we won’t survive unless we stop burning fossil fuels.
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Converging on White House, Progressives Tell Biden to Cancel Mountain Valley Pipeline
The president "can stop MVP just like he stopped Keystone XL" and "can reclaim his climate legacy by stopping all new fossil fuel projects."
Jun 08, 2023
Progressives descended upon the White House on Thursday to demand that U.S. President Joe Biden use his executive authority to cancel the Mountain Valley Pipeline and declare a climate emergency to expedite the end of the fossil fuel era.
Approval of the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) was fast-tracked last week via the debt ceiling agreement that Biden, eschewing his options for unilateral action, forged with House Republicans who took the global economy hostage. The fracked gas development in Appalachia—pushed hard by the GOP and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), a coal profiteer and Congress' top recipient of Big Oil money—is one of several fossil fuel projects that Biden has the power to stop.
While Biden was inside the White House talking with right-wing United Kingdom Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, hundreds of people gathered outside to remind the president that "he can stop MVP just like he stopped Keystone XL." The rally was organized by People vs. Fossil Fuels, a coalition of more than 1,200 organizations. It marks the start of multiple days of action nationwide.
\u201cBREAKING: Frontline communities (@OurWVRivers, @POWHR_Coalition, and more) and allies are rallying for Biden to declare a climate emergency and stop dirty oil and gas projects like the Mountain Valley Pipeline.\u201d— Elise Joshi (@Elise Joshi) 1686250842
Many people wore masks due to the hazardous air quality in Washington, D.C. The East Coast's smoke-filled skies are a direct result of climate change-intensified wildfires now spiraling out of control in Canada—a fact that observers were keen to point to as evidence for why Biden should revoke the permits needed to complete MVP and other planet-heating fossil fuel projects.
\u201cLawmakers in the Senate now can\u2019t see the Washington Monument because of wildfire smoke. Those same lawmakers just voted to expedite a fossil fuel pipeline.\u201d— David Sirota (@David Sirota) 1686228891
\u201cCan\u2019t stop thinking about how Congress just had to prevent a fake and manufactured \u201cdebt ceiling crisis\u201d by fast-tracking fossil fuel projects like the Mountain Valley Pipeline which will only make the very real climate crisis even worse. This is the price of corruption. Look up.\u201d— Warren Gunnels (@Warren Gunnels) 1686191276
When asked by a reporter Wednesday if the coalition planned to cancel Thursday's protest as a public health precaution, Fossil Free Media director Jamie Henn said, "No, this is exactly why we have to take these sorts of actions." On Thursday, he added that "we're not going to sit idle as the world burns."
A separate rally scheduled for Thursday in New York City had to be canceled, however, because the record-setting air pollution blanketing the country's most populous metropolitan area in an apocalyptic orange haze poses too great a risk.
"We're fighting for a future," West Virginia resident Maury Johnson said during the demonstration in the nation's capital. "Not one that's filled with smoke."
Climate justice advocates were joined outside the White House by Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.). Noting that MVP has nothing to do with raising the nation's debt limit—an arbitrary and arguably unconstitutional cap on federal borrowing the GOP has weaponized to impose its agenda on multiple occasions—the progressive lawmaker denounced the inclusion of the project's approval in the debt ceiling deal.
\u201c\ud83d\udd25\ud83d\udd25\ud83d\udd25\u201cWe have the right to breathe clean air. Do you know what 1 asthma attack can do to a whole family? Mountain Valley Pipeline should never have been part of the debt ceiling deal. I call bullshit!\u201d @RepRashida \ud83d\udd25\ud83d\udd25\ud83d\udd25 @POTUS #StopMVP #EndtheEra #ClimateEmergency @FightFossils\u201d— Ben Goloff (@Ben Goloff) 1686249477
As The Guardianreported Thursday, "The Mountain Valley Pipeline project has been enmeshed in legal challenges for years due to opposition from grassroots groups and landowners but the deal passed by Congress to raise the U.S. debt ceiling, signed by Biden over the weekend, singles out the pipeline as being 'required in the national interest' and therefore should be allowed to proceed, shielded from any future judicial review."
The approval of MVP comes just months after Biden greenlighted ConocoPhillips' massive Willow oil drilling project in the Alaskan Arctic. Additionally, despite possessing the executive authority to cancel nearly two dozen proposed fracked gas export projects that threaten to generate heat-trapping emissions equivalent to roughly 400 new coal-fired power plants, the Biden administration has moved to increase fracked gas export capacity, especially in the U.S. Gulf Coast, since Russia invaded Ukraine last February. The president has also rubber-stamped more permits for fossil fuel extraction on public lands and waters than his White House predecessor.
The Biden administration has done all of those things despite mounting evidence of the climate emergency's worsening toll and ample warnings from scientists about the incompatibility of expanding fossil fuels and preserving a livable planet. United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres recently told Biden and other wealthy country officials in no uncertain terms that their current climate policies amount to a civilizational "death sentence."
People vs. Fossil Fuels has argued that the president "can reclaim his climate legacy by stopping all new fossil fuel projects."
Thursday's rally outside the White House marks the beginning of what the coalition called "a stampede of distributed actions across the country" from June 8-11.
Participants have four main demands for Biden:
- End new fossil fuel projects, including Willow and the Alaska LNG project;
- Phase out ongoing oil and gas drilling on public lands;
- Declare a climate emergency; and
- Make renewable energy technology more available for homes and transportation.
As another alliance of progressive advocacy groups has explained: "The president has a long list of actions that he could take or instruct his agencies to take, ranging from stopping fossil fuel infrastructure approvals to instructing the [U.S. Environmental Protection Agency] to issue a stringent pollution prevention rule for the oil and gas sector. Declaring a climate emergency under the National Emergencies Act would unlock additional statutory powers, including the ability to halt crude oil exports and directing funds to build resilient, distributed renewable energy."
In a statement this week, Zero Hour organizing director Magnolia Mead said that "young people are angry and fed up with watching President Biden cave to the fossil fuel industry time and time again."
"We need an immediate transition to renewable energy to slow the climate crisis, and that's impossible while our president is still approving massive fossil fuel expansion," said Mead. "If President Biden cares at all for future generations and frontline communities, he must choose to end the era of fossil fuels."
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