By Kevin Mooney
The Energy Foundation China (EFC), a U.S.-registered nonprofit with primary operations in Beijing, heads up one of the major conduits for this progressive lawfare effort. EFC has teamed up with the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), a New York City-based nonprofit serving as one of the primary litigators. In an interview, Melissa Landry, director of the Pelican Center for Energy at the Pelican Institute for Public Policy in New Orleans, described how China, the EDF, and other key influencers from inside and outside the U.S. have zeroed in on her state.
“The Energy Foundation China is led by individuals with prior roles in China’s state policy climate apparatus and operates within China’s broader policy ecosystem,” Landry said. “It has received tens of millions of dollars from foreign foundations and distributes funding to organizations working to influence U.S. energy and climate policy.”
The EFC was previously an affiliate of the Energy Foundation, a San Francisco based left-of-center grant making institution. In 2019, the two entities separated into independent nonprofits. Although EFC technically maintains a presence in San Francisco, most of its operations appear concentrated in Beijing. That’s one reason why the group has come under congressional scrutiny. In June 2025, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, chair of the Senate Subcommittee on Federal Courts, Oversight, Agency Action, and Federal Rights, held a hearing titled “Enter the Dragon — China and the Left’s Lawfare Against American Energy Dominance.” The hearing focused attention on the EFC and the U.S.-based green groups it finances. In addition to the EFC, these include the Natural Resources Defense Council in New York, The Rocky Mountain Institute in Colorado, The World Resources Institute in Washington D.C., and others.
Foreign and Domestic Lawfare Against American Energy
Regarding Louisiana, Landry sees the EDF, and by extension China, leading the charge with abusive litigation practices deliberately designed to hamstring American energy companies. Public filings show that between 2016 and 2023 EDF received grants totaling more than $2.7 million from the Energy Foundation China and the U.S. Energy Foundation.
But China is not going it alone overseas.
Grant data shows the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation in the United Kingdom and the Oak Foundation in Switzerland have provided the EDF with almost $20 million. Here in the U.S., the EDF also receives funding from some of the most potent institutional philanthropies in the U.S. environmental advocacy ecosystem. These U.S.-based outfits include Bloomberg Philanthropies, the Ford Foundation, the MacArthur Foundation, the Moore Foundation, and the Packard Foundation.
“These funding streams support a coordinated national strategy that combines research, litigation, and regulatory advocacy, and this strategy is increasingly visible in Louisiana,” Landry said. “EDF has backed aggressive lawsuits targeting oil and gas production and has intervened in litigation challenging federal environmental rules, including the state’s challenge to EPA toxic air standards.”
Landry is particularly concerned with an amicus brief EDF filed supporting the federal government in Chevron v. Plaquemines Parish, a case she says has “far-reaching implications for coastal litigation and energy liability.”
The Role of Dark Money
The Energy Foundation spinoff operates as an indirect funding source for the groups like the EDF willing to do Beijing’s bidding. The goal, Landry explained, is to channel resources into litigation, regulatory advocacy, and public campaigns all aimed at reducing or restricting domestic fossil fuel production. Other examples of intermediary funding sources include the ClimateWorks Foundation based in San Francisco and the New Venture Fund, which is part of the dark money Arabella Advisors network based in Washington D.C. ClimateWorks contributed more than $1 million to EDF since 2016, while EDF recognizes the New Venture Fund among its long list of radically progressive benefactors that have contributed $100,000 or more.
EDF has developed into one of the largest environmental advocacy groups in the world since its formation in 1967. Back then the group operated with a $3 million budget. But EDF’s latest 990 tax form shows the group’s net assets standing at almost $300 million as of 2024. The environmental activist group has received grants from more than 30 organizations, according to Influence Watch.
EDF also operates a PAC known as the Environmental Defense Action Fund (EDFA) — another beneficiary of Arabella Advisors. The dark money network’s Sixteen Thirty Fund has contributed over $3 million to EDFA since 2020.
The Pelican Institute’s just released report titled: “Barriers to Louisiana Energy Dominance” goes into some additional details about anti-energy activism. The think tank estimates that at least $115.5 million in out-of-state funding—primarily from California, Washington D.C., and New York—flows into Louisiana-based groups working to take down the state’s energy sector.
Top donors of this effort include Bloomberg Philanthropies, the Bezos Earth Fund, Waverley Street Foundation, the Windward Fund, also part of the Arabella network, and the Tides Foundation. The Pelican Institute report also highlights the relationship between the Energy Foundation China and Earthjustice, a San Francisco-based public interest law firm that litigates on behalf of left-of-center climate and environmental causes. In 1995, Earthjustice registered as a foreign agent under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) to satisfy the legal requirements of the work it has done on behalf of foreign actors. The registration expired in 2021.
Possible Solutions
The Pelican Institute has produced what it calls a “six-pillar framework” designed to enable Louisiana to achieve its full energy potential with litigation and regulatory reform figuring prominently into this plan.
The six pillars:
Streamline Permitting and Environmental Reviews Responsibly
Reduce Litigation Risk and Regulatory Uncertainty
Advance Sensible Tax Policy
Enhance Market Competition
Expand Consumer Choice in Electric Power
Remove Unnecessary Government Barriers
At the national level, Rep. Harriet Hageman, a Wyoming Republican, has introduced the Stop Climate Shakedowns Act of 2026 to insulate the American energy industry.
“Energy security is national security, and we will not self-sabotage our critical industries with a cascade of costly lawsuits and extreme penalties that jeopardize American drilling,” Rep. Hageman said in a press release. “America’s energy producers should be protected from the dangerous legal precedent that would be set by the retroactive punishment of lawful activity.”
Stricter enforcement of the FARA law and its transparency requirements could also act as a deterrent against green pressure groups in league with China and other hostile foreign actors. Until then, states can play a valuable role in filling the void. Earlier this year, Arkansas, Florida, Louisiana, Nebraska, Oklahoma, and Texas enacted “Baby FARA” laws calling on individuals and entities operating in league with foreign governments to disclose these relationships.
These steps at the state and federal level will go a long way toward shutting off the limitless funding spigot that force multiplies the influence of radical nonprofits and the Chinese Communist Party, which has progressively increased its attempt to undermine America’s global dominance.
This article originally appeared at Restoration News
