Opinion

Climate lawfare's back-channel campaign, and how you'll pay the bill

House Judiciary Committee documents reveal how activists targeted judges with seminars and shaped a science manual

By Josh Hammer Fox News

Published October 23, 2026 11:03am EDT

Comments Facebook Twitter Threads Flipboard Print Email Add Fox News on Google

close

Video

Supreme Court weighs landmark climate change lawsuit in Colorado

A landmark climate change lawsuit in Boulder County, Colorado, could trigger an avalanche of litigation if the Supreme Court rules against oil companies. Stuart Varney warns that allowing individual municipalities to set national energy policy would inevitably raise prices for consumers. Skeptical justices during oral arguments suggest the high court is unlikely to approve this radical expansion of corporate liability.

NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!

In The Federalist No. 78, Alexander Hamilton famously promised that the federal judiciary would have "neither FORCE nor WILL, but merely judgment." The climate lawfare movement has spent the better part of a decade trying to prove Hamilton wrong.

Earlier this month, the Supreme Court heard oral argument in Suncor Energy v. County Commissioners of Boulder County, in which Boulder seeks to use Colorado public nuisance law to make two energy companies pay for the effects of global climate change.

The case is the culmination of a long campaign.

SUPREME COURT BEGINS NEW TERM WITH HIGH-PROFILE LOOK AT CLEAN AIR AND FEDERAL AUTHORITY

A small, well-funded network of climate activists, convinced that drastic action is needed to save the planet and frustrated that their fellow citizens have not voted to dismantle the fossil-fuel industry, have turned to state and local courts after the Supreme Court unanimously shut down federal climate-nuisance suits in 2011’s American Electric Power v. Connecticut. Their strategy rests on a single premise: When the front door of democracy is closed, try the courthouse back door.

Video

But thanks to........

© Fox News