‘Shocking and inappropriate’: Legal experts slam judges’ guide over climate bias claims
A gold-standard guide used by judges nationwide to address subjects they are not particularly versed in is drawing criticism over the latest edition’s inclusion of purported ideological bias focused on its climate section.
Critics have said the fourth edition of the Federal Judicial Center’s Reference Manual on Scientific Evidence – which includes a foreword by Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan – appears to blur the line between neutrally educating judges and indoctrinating them with left-wing advocates’ prose.
The approximately 1,600-page guide was released at the beginning of the year and includes several citations and footnotes to climate change activists and proponents, including climatologist Michael Mann and environmental law expert Jessica Wentz.
Wentz is the topline expert at the Climate Judiciary Project at the Environmental Law Institute — an entity currently under federal investigation, as Fox News Digital recently reported.
"The Committee on the Judiciary is investigating allegations of improper attempts by the Environmental Law Institute (ELI) and its Climate Judiciary Project (CJP) to influence federal judges," read a statement from House Judiciary Committee members Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, and Darrell Issa, R-Calif.
Jordan and Issa found evidence of efforts to "influence judges who potentially may be presiding over lawsuits related to alleged climate change claims… [which] appear to have the underlying goal of predisposing federal judges in favor of plaintiffs alleging injuries from the manufacturing, marketing, use, or sale of fossil-fuel products."
SCOOP: WHITE HOUSE BACKS IMPEACHING 'ROGUE' JUDGES ACCUSED OF PARTISAN RULINGS
A spokesperson for the institute told Fox News Digital at the time that CJP’s curriculum is "fact-based and science-first, grounded in consensus reports and developed with a robust peer review process" and that suggestions otherwise are "without merit."
Wentz, who is also a senior fellow at Columbia’s Sabin Center for Climate Law, is listed as chief author of the section, along with fellow university faculty Radley Horton, on page 1561.
She served as a witness for the plaintiffs in Juliana v. U.S., where youth activists accused the U.S. government of violating their constitutional rights by failing to implement their preferred climate change policies.
She also signed an amicus brief supporting the Obama administration’s environmental regulations after multiple states filed lawsuits against the EPA in 2016.
Nonetheless, legal experts warned of the potential repercussions down the line of having such prominent contributors in what is supposed to be an apolitical anthology.
"It is alarming to see how far the Left has gone in its blatant effort to capture the judiciary. Its feeding of trial lawyers’ climate 'science' to sitting judges who will decide contentious litigation in this area short-circuits our system of justice," said Carrie Severino, a former law clerk for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and president of the Judicial Crisis Network.
"When they can’t pass their extreme policies into law, they are attempting to use the courts as an end run around the legislative process," said Severino, whose organization has helped vet judicial nominees, including Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett.
Michael Fragoso of Torridon Law, former chief counsel to Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., agreed that there is rank bias throughout the climate section of the anthology.
SUPREME COURT MUST FREEZE THE CLIMATE EXTORTION OF OUR ENERGY INDUSTRY
"The whole section of the guide is shockingly inappropriate—and if you look at the organizational meeting at the National Academies, intentionally so," Fragoso said.
"But when you dig into it, it only gets worse. The section on attribution ‘science,’ for example, was lifted in large part by a previous article written by the two authors and Michael Burger, who is himself a climate-plaintiff lawyer."
"Given that attribution is at the heart of these lawsuits, it’s shocking that the Judicial Center would let a plaintiff lawyer ‘explain’ it to judges. It’s even worse that it’s hidden in a random footnote," said Fragoso, who recently analyzed a key energy-related suit in Louisiana.
The House Judiciary Committee previously alleged CJP’s efforts appear to have the underlying goal of predisposing federal judges in favor of plaintiffs involved in climate litigation.
Mann, a climate change academic in Pennsylvania, authored a book called "The New Climate War," and the judges’ guide cites the book to claim the energy industry has sought to deceive the public.
He resigned from a role at the University of Pennsylvania in 2025 after disparaging social media comments about Charlie Kirk that invoked the Hitler Youth movement, and previously successfully sued conservative commentator Mark Steyn for $1 million over aggressive criticism of his famous "hockey stick graph" that resulted from his study of human influence on global warming over the centuries.
When asked about criticisms of her role in crafting the guide, Wentz told Fox News Digital, "no comment." Mann did not respond to a request for comment.
Fox News Digital's Elizabeth Elkind contributed to this report.