Tennessee AG leads 23-state letter over climate chapter in federal judges’ manual

By Tom Joyce
The Center Square

Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti is leading a 23-state letter demanding answers from the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts over a climate science chapter in a federal judicial evidence manual.The letter, addressed to Administrative Office Director Robert J. Conrad Jr., expresses concerns about the Federal Judicial Center and the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.The attorneys general say the groups helped create the Fourth Edition of the Reference Manual on Scientific Evidence, which included a climate science chapter they say favored one side in climate litigation.The letter says the chapter “functions as an ex parte brief for one side of ongoing litigation.”The attorneys general also said the chapter could affect the rights of parties in court.“Federal judges who rely on the Manual to assist them in their duties could inadvertently prejudice litigants due to the bias baked into the chapter on climate science,” the letter says.Skrmetti and the other attorneys general say 27 attorneys general wrote to Federal Judicial Center Director Judge Robin L. Rosenberg in January. That letter noted “methodological and bias concerns” with the chapter.The new letter says the Federal Judicial Center told the attorneys general Feb. 6 that it had removed the chapter.“The Federal Judicial Center has omitted the climate science chapter from the Reference Manual on Scientific Evidence, Fourth Edition,” Rosenberg wrote, according to the letter.The attorneys general praised that decision. However, they said the issue remains because of printed copies and the National Academies’ response.The letter says NASEM President Marcia McNutt told the attorneys general Feb. 26 that “[t]he manual, including the chapter on climate science, will continue to be available on the Academy’s website.”The attorneys general said the issue created a conflict between the two groups.“The result is a direct conflict between the institutional judgment of the FJC – which concluded the chapter should not be placed before federal judges – and the ongoing conduct of NASEM, which continues to make the chapter available and may seek to have it circulated more broadly,” the letter says.The attorneys general asked Conrad to confirm that no hard copies distributed through the Federal Judicial Center or Administrative Office channels will include the climate chapter. They also asked him to confirm that no hard copies containing the chapter have gone to federal judges.They also asked Conrad to bring the conflict to the Judicial Conference’s attention. “That the AoC bring to the attention of the Judicial Conference the conflict between FJC’s omission decision and NASEM’s refusal to follow that decision, so that the Conference may consider what further steps are appropriate,” the letter says.Jason Isaac, CEO of the American Energy Institute, backed the attorneys general.“The American Energy Institute stands with Attorney General Skrmetti and this coalition of 23 attorneys general in exposing a brazen attempt to rig the federal judiciary against American energy,” Isaac said in a statement provided to The Center Square. “While we applauded the Federal Judicial Center for omitting the climate chapter, the entire Reference Manual should be rescinded and the FJC itself investigated. A chapter authored by activists suing energy companies has no business shaping how federal judges weigh evidence, and the public deserves to know how this lawfare playbook made it inside the judiciary’s own research arm in the first place.”The attorneys general from Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, West Virginia, and Wyoming joined Tennessee’s letter.