The House Judiciary Committee launched an investigation Friday into an environmental activist group for allegedly seeking to bias judges hearing climate-related cases, the Daily Caller News Foundation has learned.

The Climate Judiciary Project (CJP), a project of the Environmental Law Institute (ELI), offers a curriculum that has been used to educate nearly 2,000 judges on the impact of climate change. CJP’s efforts “appear to have the underlying goal of predisposing federal and state judges in favor of plaintiffs alleging injuries from the manufacturing, marketing, or sale of fossil-fuel products,” the committee wrote in an Aug. 29 letter to ELI President Jordan Diamond obtained by the DCNF. The Daily Caller has the story.

Public reports indicate several judges presiding over key climate-related cases have worked with ELI.

Hawaii Supreme Court Chief Justice Mark Recktenwald oversaw Honolulu’s lawsuit seeking damages from oil companies for their alleged contribution to climate change, though he previously taught a course and gave presentations for ELI, the DCNF reported in 2023. One of the attorneys who represented Honolulu, Michael Burger, has also spoke at ELI events.

U.S. District Court Judge Ann Aiken, who oversaw a case brought by youth alleging the federal government violated their rights by encouraging the use of fossil fuels, likewise participated in a 2020 ELI event. The Supreme Court declined in March to revive the case, ending litigation that stretched over nearly a decade.

CJP also operated an online forum from Sept. 2022 to May 2024 allowing CJP leaders to directly communicate with judges, though the public link was recently taken down, according to Fox News.

“Any attempt to suggest that the Climate Judiciary Project’s judicial educational activities are improper is entirely without merit,” ELI said in a statement to the DCNF. “CJP provides evidence-based and factual information to judges about climate science and how it is arising in the law in partnership with leading national and state judicial education institutions through their established programs. These programs are no different than other judicial education programs providing training on legal and scientific topics that judges voluntarily choose to attend.”

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