“You keep using that word…”

“Neutrality,” Neutered

As CLW readers know, The Environmental Law Institute (ELI) and The National Judicial College (NJC) collaborate on judicial “education” programs, that advance the climate plaintiffs’ positions through ELI’s Climate Judiciary Project (CJP). CLW readers also know when, how and why this thoroughly inappropriate response to courts rejecting the “climate” plaintiffs’ claims came to be.

You also know that, having been outed, ELI and its partners have insisted that they “provide neutral educational seminars and resources to judges regarding climate science and environmental litigation.” CLW readers know that claim is risible. These programs feature plaintiffs’ witnesses, longtime filers of amicus briefs supportive of climate-industry stances, and, more recently, other public advocates for the climate industry’s positions. But they do so ex parte, before only an audience of judges, and without any opportunity for cross examination or rebuttal.

One presentation given to judges, and recently flagged by CLW, confirms once again that the public-facing neutrality claim is a fib:

Then there’s this:

Judges are being “educated” in advance on the plaintiffs’ case. The obviousness of this becomes clearer still if one considers the counterfactual: Big Oil, conservative foundations, the NRA, a right-to-life organization, or others presenting their preferred positions to judges.

“Oh, that’s different”.

True. You may also recall from several years ago a hair-on-fire outrage over seminars teaching judges about the connection between law and economics, and having supporters who were “frequent litigants in federal courts“. That charge is itself meaningless. Sadly, every large entity is forced to litigate frequently. In any event, those programs cannot compare with a scheme in which the plaintiffs’ bar presents its “expert witnesses” for a wave of cases that, as presenters and judges acknowledge at the outset, those judges may soon hear.

And at least one judge, filling out an evaluation form, went out of his way to acknowledge the obvious…

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22 Comments

Dave Burton

August 13, 2026 10:13 pm

I suspect that those “neutral” seminars and resources might have forgotten to include illustrations like this:

And this:

Maybe, instead of pretending to be “neutral” they should seek balance. After all, that’s how the courts are supposed to work.

“The fundamental requisite of due process of law is the opportunity to be heard.”– Justice Mahlon Pitney’s opinion in Grannis v. Ordean

“Audi alteram partem” (hear the other side). – Seneca

Beta Blocker

August 13, 2026 10:24 pm

What do you do as a juror in a civil lawsuit trial where you must evaluate the scientific and medical testimony presented by two expert witnesses, one for the lawsuit’s plaintiff and the other for the lawsuit’s defendant?

The Lawsuit Scenario:

The two expert witnesses are both licensed physicians who possess two equally valid medical science credentials in terms of education and past experience in a highly specialized type of medical practice.

But in the course of the trial, they present two completely different explanations for the causes of a person’s pain and swelling symptoms. You as a sworn member of the jury must decide which explanation to accept.

The Trial:

Twenty years ago in the summer of 2006, I was chosen as a juror in a civil trial where a woman who had been injured in a three-car accident on a bridge over the Columbia River was suing the at-fault driver’s insurance company for a larger settlement than the company was willing to give her.

The insurance company offered her the cost of her immediate medical expenses, about $22,000, plus $15,000 for pain and suffering and for time lost at work. The woman wasn’t happy with that offer and sued for the $22,000 plus $300,000 for pain, suffering, and time lost at work.

Prior to the accident, this woman had been employed for a number of years as a fruit sorter on the production line of a local food processing plant.

The insurance company’s expert witness said that her symptoms, pain and swelling in her wrists and forearms, were caused by repetitive motion injuries she had suffered on the job working for years at the food processing plant.

The plaintiff’s expert witness said that her symptoms were a direct consequence of the car accident and were not consistent with the kinds of repetitive motion injuries usually suffered by workers in these processing plants.

Both expert witnesses presented an array of medical and scientific evidence which supported their respective positions. Both were equally articulate in expressing their medical and scientific opinions. Both exhibited a similarly professional attitude and demeanor.

But their respective conclusions were in direct contradiction to each other. It was all one thing or all another; i.e., it was all because of the car accident or it was all because of work-related repetitive motion injury.

The Jury’s Decision:

At the completion of the expert witness testimonies, the judge’s instruction to the jury was simple. Perform your own assessment of the two expert testimonies and come to a fair and equitable decision as to how much compensation is owed to the plaintiff.

Our assessment of the two expert testimonies didn’t take one or the other as the most credible and true explanation for the woman’s symptoms.

Rather, the evidence presented in the combined testimonies indicated that the car accident had aggravated a previously existing medical condition. And so the woman was owed something more than the insurance company was offering, but not the $300,000 she was asking for.

IIRC, we gave her $22,000 for her direct medical expenses and $50,000 for pain, suffering, and loss of time at work.

A Quirk of Accident Fate:

Here is the interesting thing about this particular jury, and about the venue in which the trial took place. The jury in this civil trial was of a different composition from most juries who serve in these kinds of civil cases.

About a quarter of the jurors were scientists and engineers, another quarter were professionals of one kind or another, and the remainder were either the wives or adult children of professionals. The elected jury foreman was a science project manager with a masters degree in the biological sciences.

How was the venue for the trial chosen?

The bridge over the Columbia River on which the accident occurred links Franklin County on the north with Benton County on the south. The county line lies in the exact center of the bridge. The accident itself occurred about two-hundred feet south of the county line, which put the event inside Benton County.

Which is why the trial took place in Benton County, a locality which is populated by a number of scientists, engineers, and other professionals of various kinds.

What if the accident had happened two-hundred feet north of the county line inside Franklin County, instead of two-hundred feet south of the line in Benton County?

If that’s where the accident had occurred, the venue would have been in Franklin County, and the jury probably would have been composed of sympathetic working class people who very likely would have given the plaintiff every penny she had asked for, and more.

Mr.

Reply to Beta Blocker

August 14, 2026 8:39 am

“what if” contemplations can drive us to the point of manic, un-solvable frustration.

“that way lies madness . . . “

King Lear

Beta Blocker

Reply to Mr.

August 14, 2026 9:44 am

If the mass extinction event caused by the asteroid strike 65 million years ago hadn’t wiped out the dinosaurs, we wouldn’t be talking about climate change 65 million years later. Because we as humans wouldn’t be here.

Likewise, if World War II hadn’t happened, then I myself wouldn’t be here to talk about climate change issues.

Anyway, the car accident occurred in the southbound lane during rush hour as a traffic jam was developing on the bridge. The traffic jam was a contributing factor in the accident sequence along with the at-fault driver’s mistakes.

Had the accident occurred just a minute or two later, the traffic jam would have already extended onto the north side of the bridge and the subsequent trial would have been held in Franklin County rather than in Benton County.

I would not have been called as a juror and therefore my comment about an event from twenty years ago would never have been posted.

Rod Evans

August 13, 2026 10:51 pm

Judges and juries are consistently reminded they are in place to weigh the evidence presented in court.
Any attempt by parties with vested interests to prepare the process by ‘educating’ the judge in matters that may or may not be raised in the case is a clear breach of the principles depicted in the statue of Lady Justice.
If this preparatory education was a valid aid to justice delivery, then all judges would be required to be constantly educated about all matters that may present at court.
I suspect this type of pre loading the judicial dice with limited possibly selective knowledge has a malicious unjust foundation.

joe-Dallas

Reply to Rod Evans

August 14, 2026 6:29 am

If this “education ” occurred during the trial, it would definitely be ex parte which is absolute a No – No.

This “education” is the equivalent to being “pre-Ex Parte”

Mr.

Reply to Rod Evans

August 14, 2026 8:41 am

A disinterested observer’s long-held conclusion –
the US legal system is so fucked up.

Beta Blocker

Reply to Mr.

August 14, 2026 10:15 am

The DSA is now pre-training their followers in what decisions to make if they are called as jurors in any kind of criminal or civil trial which impacts the DSA’s Marxist-communist agenda.

In a criminal trial, they vote either guilty or not guilty for the defendant, depending on the circumstances of the trial. In a civil trial, they vote for either the plaintiff or for the defendant, depending on the circumstances of the specific lawsuit.

Whichever trial outcome serves the interests of the DSA’s Marxist-communist agenda, that’s what these followers are being trained to vote for if they are selected for service on a jury.

And if the prospective juror is asked if he or she has been pre-trained to choose a pre-specified decision during a criminal or civil trial, they are to deny that any such training ever took place.

F. Leghorn

Reply to Beta Blocker

August 14, 2026 1:47 pm

I don’t doubt that for a minute. I’m just shocked that they are so open about it. Their leader David Jenkins openly says “our goal is communism”

stinkerp

August 13, 2026 11:57 pm

The word you’re hinting at is “indoctrination.” Judges don’t need to be “educated” on any of the science of climate and weather. Their expertise is law. There are no applicable laws for these ridiculous “attribution” lawsuits, which is why the climate barbarians are trying to indoctrinate judges and recruit them into their insane religion..

Only a complete moron would see a link between random natural weather events, modest, slow climate change over several human lifetimes, and a wealthy Exxon Mobil executive in a skyscraper in Houston supposedly plotting the demise of the planet like Dr. Doom. It’s bizarre that any judge would entertain these ludicrous cases for even a second instead of dismissing them for lack of evidence, fining the plaintiffs heavily for wasting the judge’s time and clogging the legal system with frivolous, meritless cases, and laughing the looney plaintiffs out of court, because they are raving, malign lunatics and should be treated accordingly.

F. Leghorn

Reply to stinkerp

August 14, 2026 1:48 pm

And throwing out the ‘complainants’ with prejudice.

David Dibbell

August 14, 2026 4:15 am

I hold that the proper context in which to judge the validity of a claimed influence of incremental CO2 on “warming” or on ANY trend of climate variables, is the observed dynamics of the general circulation. Energy conversion massively overwhelms the “warming” tendency estimated from radiative transfer computations. Therefore the primary attribution fails. This is not hard to demonstrate using the ERA5 reanalysis, with its “vertical integral of energy conversion” hourly parameter.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1knv0YdUyIgyR9Mwk3jGJwccIGHv38J33/view?usp=drive_link

More background, references, plots, and a time-lapse video here for a complete explanation.

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1PDJP3F3rteoP99lR53YKp2fzuaza7Niz?usp=drive_link

The core claim has been unsound all along. NO ONE KNOWS that emissions of CO2 must be expected to exert ANY perceptible influence on the energy state of the climate system.

Thank you for your patient attention to this matter.

starzmom

August 14, 2026 5:40 am

I had occasion to argue a case where my client was charged with drunk driving. She was never tested for blood alcohol, but exhibited signs of impairment. It was very cold that night and she was hospitalized where her temperature registered well below normal. My judge had been at one time a pre-med student, and immediately recognized that she was clinically hypothermic. I didn’t have to argue very hard, and won the case.

That said, having a scientifically competent judge is always good, but you want them to have the benefit of all the facts, not just a one sided version of debatable information.

Tom Abbott

August 14, 2026 5:58 am

Where are the lawsuits seeking to stop this one-sided climate change propaganda effort aimed at the judiciary?

Any judge who has been exposed to this climate change propaganda should be required to recuse himself from any climate change cases. And if they don’t, that would be a reason for the defense lawyers to request they do so on the basis that the judge is potentially biased as a result of listening to climate change propaganda but not hearing a rebuttal of the propaganda.

Attribution is an opinion, not an established fact. Judges should stick to the provable facts in their decisions. That is their one and only job: Separating facts from fiction. They won’t get this listening to propagandists who claim opinions are facts.

The groups propagandizing the judges should be sued to cease and desist with the lies and distortions.

Who funds these groups? Perhaps they need to be investigated by the DOJ.

David Dibbell

Reply to Tom Abbott

August 14, 2026 6:22 am

“Attribution is an opinion, not an established fact.”
Agreed. This is important. Even among reliable skeptics of climate alarm, it needs to be better understood that given the established facts of CO2’s IR properties, it does NOT follow as a fact that emissions have anything to do with the reported “warming.”

Dave Burton

Reply to Tom Abbott

August 14, 2026 8:23 am

Tom asked, “Who funds these groups?”

That’s a great question. The $3.4 trillion (that’s trillion with a “T”) per year parasitic climate industry is responsible for funding the climate propaganda juggernaut, but it’s mostly done indirectly. They try to use other people’s money. They fund the lobbying campaigns which influence governments to spend your money, and they use a web of corporate influence (lobbying, overlapping boards, etc.) to divert corporate philanthropy.

The financial connections and incentives aren’t always obvious. For instance, ELI has connections to the global reinsurance industry, which has a vested interest in hyping imaginary climate risks, because it enables them to charge more for their financial products, and increases their profit margins. That’s why some of the most extreme activists in the climate biz, like the Potsdam Institute (PIK), are financed by reinsurance giants, like Munich Re.

It’s a lucrative grift. The President of “non-profit” ELI, H. Jordan Diamond, earns more than $300,000 per year.

Attribution of “climate harm” is, indeed, opinion and speculation, rather than established fact. But attribution of the funding sources for these climate industry propaganda groups is a matter of accounting, network mapping, and donor tracing.

oeman50

August 14, 2026 6:26 am

Attribution “Science”

“..a focus on extreme events particularly heat waves and hurricanes”

In other words, weather, not climate.

Mr.

Reply to oeman50

August 14, 2026 8:45 am

In other words – “conjecture”

Jeff Alberts

Reply to Mr.

August 14, 2026 6:29 pm

In other words – “agitprop”

KentN

August 14, 2026 8:35 am

Every judge that has participated in this indoctrination needs to also see a presentation of the counter arguments, or recuse themselves in any related case.

Peter Barrett

August 14, 2026 11:40 am

Of course, nothing like this could ever occur in the UK.

Bob

August 14, 2026 6:52 pm

It isn’t even up for debate. Everyone knows that any judge attending one of these seminars is soiled. I wouldn’t outlaw the seminars but I would enable anyone who appears before such a judge to have the right to protest that they were judged unfairly and all their legal fees must be paid by the other side and any judgement nullified and a second trial would be viewed as illegal.