00:10These lawsuits aren't meant to succeed on the merits.
00:13They're designed to exhaust, to intimidate, and to destroy America's energy sector.
00:18Death by a thousand cuts.
00:20We've even seen private parties get in on the act.
00:23One of the most infamous examples was Juliana v. United States,
00:28where 21 people sued the federal government claiming that allowing climate change to persist violated their due process rights.
00:35A federal district judge in Oregon actually agreed,
00:39comparing the right to a stable climate to the right to same-sex marriage.
00:44She was prepared to enjoin the entire federal government,
00:48effectively putting the energy industry into judicial receivership at the behest of, quote, children.
00:56Fortunately, the Ninth Circuit, by far the most liberal court of appeals in the country, shut it down,
01:03and eventually a unanimous Supreme Court did it as well.
01:07Funded by deep-pocketed climate activists and left-wing dark money,
01:13the anti-American energy lobby and its allies in the plaintiff's bar have initiated dozens of civil lawsuits against American energy producers.
01:22These suits, which assert state law claims under dubious nuisance toward or consumer protection theories,
01:28are properly preempted by federal law.
01:31Nevertheless, they have proliferated across the country,
01:34and they are exposing energy producers to potentially trillions of dollars in damages.
01:40There are now more than 30 active lawsuits across the country
01:43accusing energy producers of misleading the public about carbon emissions and climate change.
01:49If successful, these suits could destroy millions of jobs and raise the energy cost of every consumer in America.
01:57Let me start with the legal foundations.
02:00General Kobach, have any of these climate lawsuits brought under public nuisance or similar theories been upheld on the merits by a federal appellate court?
02:10No, Senator, and none of them have been upheld on the merits by a state appellate court either.
02:17The case that is closest to a higher-level decision right now is the Baltimore case, Baltimore versus BP.
02:25It's several consolidated cases.
02:27That's basically a case where Baltimore is suing the fossil fuel industry defendants for climate change generally.
02:35A lot of these others are more specific, like shale oil production or plastics, but they're just global warming.
02:42And the district court in Baltimore ruled against the plaintiffs on all eight grounds.
02:50That's a pretty big deal.
02:52And they now are appealing to the state Supreme Court.
02:55That one will probably be decided later this year, early next year,
02:59but that's the biggest or nearest chance the plaintiffs have to achieving a victory, but they have got no victories so far.
03:05And isn't it true that many of these suits are brought by cities and counties that lack the legal standing to assert injuries on behalf of the entire public?
03:13Yes, Mr. Chairman, and that's what I was alluding to when I mentioned parents patriae.
03:17The state has the responsibility, parents patriae is Latin, of course, for parent or father of the country,
03:25and the state attorney general, which represents the state at large, has that sovereignty.
03:30Our constitution contemplates that states have sovereignty and they conceded some of that sovereignty to the federal government.
03:36But localities are creations of state government.
03:39Localities do not possess the sovereignty the state does.
03:42And so while some people may be upset that we have 50 states and the states take different positions in some of these legal cases,
03:49the states have at least the right to represent their residents.
03:53Cities do not. Counties do not.
03:55And so it massively multiplies the potential plaintiffs out there and it becomes nonsensical in a legal sense for a city in one end of a state
04:07and a city on the opposite end of the state to both purport to represent the residents of the same state.
04:12And in the cases I mentioned, they're purporting to, in a class action format, represent all representatives, represent all citizens and residents of every county in America.
04:23So they've taken public nuisance theory to a bizarre extreme and they've also usurped the authority of state attorneys general.
04:30That may help explain why they are losing so many of these cases.
04:33Mr. Walter, Sher Edling has filed dozens of climate lawsuits.
04:37Are they being paid by the government entities they represent or by anonymous left-wing donor networks like the New Venture Fund?
04:46I believe the vast majority of the funding comes from the outside funders, yes.
04:51Isn't it also true that one of the biggest sources of funding for U.S.-based environmental litigation groups is Energy Foundation China,
05:00an organization run by a former senior Chinese Communist Party official who helped craft the CCP's five-year energy plans?
05:09Energy Foundation China channels tens of millions of dollars to numerous environmental groups, yes.
05:15Now, Mr. Walter, my Democrat colleagues have said that's a crazy conspiracy theory.
05:19What is the basis for saying that Energy Foundation China is funneling so many millions of dollars into these suits?
05:26Well, their own IRS filings because they're a 501c3 registered in San Francisco.
05:31If this were really about reducing admissions, wouldn't we expect Energy Foundation China to give a damn about the worst polluter on the face of the planet, that being Communist China?
05:47That would be logical, yes, Senator.
05:50And yet, their lawsuits are designed to destroy the American energy industry, which happens to perfectly coincide with the political objective of Senate Democrats to destroy the American energy industry.
06:04Would the result of that help or hurt America, and would it help or hurt China?
06:10Well, obviously, it would help China vis-Ã -vis the United States, and it would certainly be highly problematic for everyone in the United States.
