A coalition of state attorneys general is demanding answers about the Federal Judicial Center’s (FJC) distribution of a science manual to federal judges that contained citations to left-wing climate activists.
Signed by Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti and 22 other state AGs, the May 13 letter first reported on Monday pressed Robert J. Conrad, Jr., the director of the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts, on the status of the FJC’s most recent Reference Manual on Scientific Evidence. The manual is designed to guide and inform federal judges in their assessment of science-related matters in cases that come before the bench.
The FJC — which serves as the research and educational arm of the judiciary — came under fire earlier this year when it was discovered that the manual’s most recent edition contained a “Reference Guide on Climate Science” that included citations and references to left-wing climate activists. It was only after backlash ensued that the FJC retracted the climate guide from the manual.
“That chapter was authored by advocates with documented ties to plaintiff-side climate litigation, reviewed in part by an attorney actively litigating climate change cases against energy companies, and written in a manner that presents sharply contested litigation positions as settled scientific fact. Rather than offering the federal judiciary an objective guide to scientific principles, the chapter functions as an ex parte brief for one side of ongoing litigation,” the state AG’s letter reads. “… [T]he chapter’s stamp of institutional authority effectively prejudges questions that litigants are entitled to have resolved through the adversarial process, in violation of Article III’s guarantee of an independent and impartial tribunal.”
While “encouraged” by the FJC’s February decision to retract the climate guide section from the online version of the manual, Skrmetti and the other state attorneys general expressed concern to Conrad “that FJC’s online adjustment does not fully resolve … the distribution of physical, hard-copy editions of the Manual” to federal judges. They further noted how the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) — which co-authored the manual alongside the FJC — still posts the manual’s climate section on its website, which they argue presents “a direct conflict between the institutional judgment of the FJC … and the ongoing conduct of NASEM.”
The letter reads:
This conflict creates an untenable situation for the judges the Manual is designed to serve as well as for litigants. The FJC says the chapter has been ‘omitted.’ NASEM says the chapter ‘will continue to be available.’ A federal judge who becomes aware of both positions faces an ethical puzzle that no judge should be forced to navigate: Is the chapter part of the authoritative Manual or not? May the judge consult it? Is a party’s citation to it appropriate? Even worse, litigants are left in the dark as to which version of the Manual a particular judge might reference.
The state AGs went on to note that the FJC’s move to retract the manual’s climate section was based on its “inadequacy as a guide for judicial decision-making,” but that such a decision is “defeated” if physical copies “containing the chapter remain in circulation, or if NASEM’s version is treated by litigants as carrying the FJC’s implicit endorsement.”
“Judges and the parties before them deserve clarity, and the AoC is well positioned to provide it,” the letter reads.
The May 13 communique was issued days after The Federalist reported on the far-left backgrounds of the climate section’s authors. While co-author Jessica Wentz previously espoused views similar to left-wing censors on so-called “disinformation” and seemingly anti-Trump sentiments, co-author Radley Horton used his social media presence to elevate the left’s “racial justice” agenda.
The manual’s forensics section was similarly found to have been authored by far-left academics, according to a Federalist investigation.
Skrmetti and the state attorneys general concluded their letter asking Conrad to confirm whether hard copies of the manual’s most recent edition “distributed through FJC or AoC channels will include the climate science chapter that FJC has formally omitted from its website,” and that “No hard copies containing the chapter have been distributed to members of the federal judiciary through FJC or AoC channels.” The state law enforcement officers further requested Conrad’s office notify the Judicial Conference about the discrepancy between the FJC’s retraction of the climate guide and the NASEM’s refusal to follow suit “so that the Conference may consider what further steps are appropriate.”
AOUSC Letter Re Climate Chapter TN 5.5.26 TAW KNS With Signatures 003 by The Federalist
