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Today, the highest court of Montana agreed: Children have fundamental rights to a safe and livable climate!!
16 Montana youth held their government accountable for harming their fundamental rights to health, safety, liberty, dignity, equal protection of the law, and a clean and healthful environment. Our youth clients’ voices were heard. The Montana Supreme Court has upheld science-based protections for a safe and healthy climate, affirming that fossil fuel pollution is incompatible with children’s constitutional rights and that an environmental life support system includes a stable climate system.
This was a resounding 6:1 victory!
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FOX BS
CLIMATE CHANGE
Youth-led climate change lawsuits gain momentum with backing of liberal, dark money group
'Our Children’s Trust exploits well-intentioned kids, using them as political cover,' Montana AG's office tells Fox News Digital
Thomas Catenacci By Thomas Catenacci Fox News
Published April 27, 2024
Biden seeks to engage young voters with the 'politics' of climate change
High-stakes climate litigation being pursued across the country and worldwide, purportedly on behalf of children, can be traced to a single, left-wing public interest law firm with big-money backing and ties to longtime progressive activists, Fox News Digital has learned.
The Oregon-based firm Our Children’s Trust (OCT), which is classified as a 501(c)(3) public charity, was established more than a decade ago to provide youth with legal services "to secure their legal rights to a safe climate." Since its founding, OCT has filed multiple federal lawsuits, spearheaded legal actions in all 50 states and is even involved in litigation in Canada, Mexico, Pakistan, India and Uganda.
"These young people are doing exactly what they’ve been taught by elders — when they see a wrong, they take steps to right it," Mat dos Santos, OCT's co-executive director and general counsel, said last week.
Dos Santos, who is tasked with overseeing OCT's legal program, made the comments during a rally outside the White House where activists called for President Biden to take their side in Juliana v. United States, one of several cases the group is pursuing. According to OCT, the plaintiffs in the case are 21 young Americans who are concerned the government has violated their constitutional rights to life, liberty and property.
LEFT-WING CLIMATE GROUP WITH SHADY BACKING TAKES PROMINENT ROLE AGAINST GAS STOVES
Youth plaintiffs await the start of the nation's first youth climate change trial at Montana's First Judicial District Court on June 12, 2023 in Helena, Montana.
Youth plaintiffs represented by Our Children’s Trust await the start of the nation's first youth climate change trial at Montana's First Judicial District Court in Helena, Montana, on June 12, 2023. (William Campbell/Getty Images)
OCT filed its complaint in Juliana v. United States in 2015, arguing that the federal government has contributed to global warming for decades, despite being well aware of the cataclysmic impacts of climate change. The lawsuit — which is currently making its way through the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals — takes aim at policies allowing fossil fuel extraction, transportation and combustion.
Days before the White House rally, Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., one of the original architects of the Green New Deal, released a podcast with dos Santos and some of the plaintiffs in the case. In the episode, the senior lawmaker lauded the children for "fighting against what preceding generations have done to pollute and to create this problem."
The group's growing suite of climate litigation, meanwhile, broadly follows the same format, asserting on behalf of a handful of youth that federal or state agencies are harming their future by allowing fossil fuel reliance.
BIDEN ADMIN PRESSURED SNOPES TO CHANGE ITS FACT-CHECK RATING ON RUMORED GAS STOVE BAN, INTERNAL EMAILS SHOW
OCT's most recent lawsuit was filed in December against the Environmental Protection Agency, and its most successful case so far has been Held v. State of Montana, which yielded a favorable judgment last year. The First Judicial District Court of Montana's ruling, which has since been appealed by the state, struck down certain state laws promoting fossil fuels and concluded youth plaintiffs were harmed by said laws.
"Today, for the first time in U.S. history, a court ruled on the merits of a case that the government violated the constitutional rights of children through laws and actions that promote fossil fuels, ignore climate change, and disproportionately imperil young people," Julia Olson, OCT's chief legal counsel and co-executive director, said after the ruling in August 2023.
Duke Energy wind turbines
Wind turbines are seen at the Top of the World energy facility in Rollings Hills, Wyoming. (AP Photo/Matthew Brown)
But, according to a Fox News Digital review of financial filings, career databases and recruitment documents, OCT has attracted the financial backing of major left-wing philanthropic nonprofits and is led by longtime activists. In its 2023 impact report, the group stated it receives pro bono legal support from people affiliated with Earthjustice and Oxfam America, two massive groups involved in climate lawsuits.
OCT also actively recruits children between the ages of 8 and 18 years old to serve as the face of their legal efforts. Children interested in serving as plaintiffs in OCT's cases are directed to an online interest form, which asks applicants for a wide range of contact information, including their pronouns, and how climate change has impacted them personally.
US ENERGY GIANT SOUNDS ALARM ON BIDEN'S CLIMATE RULES TARGETING POWER PLANTS
"Our Children’s Trust exploits well-intentioned kids, using them as political cover to achieve its goal of shutting down responsible energy development in Montana and around the nation," said Chase Scheuer, a spokesperson for Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen. Knudsen has taken the lead in defending his state's energy policies in Held v. State of Montana.
"Unable to implement policies through the normal processes of representative government, they are trying to override the will of the people and use the courts to impose their extremist climate agenda," Scheuer continued.
Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen
Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen is defending his state in Held v. State of Montana, which Our Children’s Trust filed on behalf of a handful of children. (Fox News)
Overall, OCT reports having more than $5.4 million in net assets and received $2.2 million in financial contributions in 2022 and $3.2 million in contributions a year prior, according to its tax forms. While the group's donors are hidden from public view, a review of various liberal nonprofits' tax forms shows the group routinely receives large grants.
For example, in 2022, it received $200,000 from the Amalgamated Charitable Foundation; $100,000 from the Alex C. Walker Foundation; $100,000 from Impact Assets; and donations worth $50,000 from the Jacob & Terese Hershey Foundation and Park Foundation, among others. Those grantmaking nonprofits generally contribute to progressive social and environmental causes.
BIDEN SET TO BLOCK MILLIONS OF ACRES IN ALASKA FROM OIL, GAS DRILLING IN EARTH DAY ACTION
The Amalgamated Foundation, OCT's apparent largest financier, is the charitable arm of Amalgamated Bank, an operation focused on progressive issues and which is majority-owned and controlled by Workers United, a division of the massive labor union Service Employees International Union (SEIU).
Under the leadership of its executive director Anna Fink, the Amalgamated Foundation spearheaded a campaign after the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot to pressure organizations to divert donations for Republicans to the Amalgamated Foundation instead. That program received backing from George Soros’ Open Society Foundation.
Sariel Sandoval is one of 16 youth plaintiffs suing the State of Montana over its contributions to climate change.
Sariel Sandoval is one of 16 youth plaintiffs suing the State of Montana over its contributions to climate change. (The Washington Post via Getty Images)
In addition, dos Santos and Olson, OCT's co-executive directors, have a long history of progressive activism.
Dos Santos remains on the boards of the Transgender Law Center, Latino Network and the Chosen Family Law Center. He also previously served as legal director of the ACLU's Oregon chapter, where he advocated for LGBT rights, immigrants and criminal justice reform. Dos Santos notably led a challenge against former President Donald Trump's immigration actions and represented a transgender inmate demanding the state provide hormone therapy.
And Olson previously served as an attorney at Earthjustice before beginning her own firm, Wild Earth Advocates.
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Other staff and members of OCT's board of directors have ties to climate-focused organizations such as the Women’s Environmental and Development Organization, Western Environmental Law Center, Food & Water Watch and Columbia University's Earth Institute.
OCT and the Amalgamated Charitable Foundation didn't respond to requests for comment.
Thomas Catenacci is a politics writer for Fox News Digital.
Conversation 638 Comments
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We’re excited to share the news that youth plaintiffs in Navahine v. Hawaiʻi Department of Transportation have secured a historic victory!
Thirteen years in the making, Navahine v. Hawaiʻi Department of Transportation is the first settlement in a constitutional climate case bringing systemic decarbonization of a state transportation system.
Yesterday, in a joint press conference with Hawaiʻi Governor Josh Green and Department of Transportation (HDOT) Director Edwin Sniffen, youth plaintiffs and their attorneys announced the groundbreaking settlement agreement, recognizing children’s constitutional rights to a life-sustaining climate and mobilizing the Hawaiʻi Department of Transportation (HDOT) to plan and implement transformative changes to fully decarbonize Hawaiʻi’s economy and transportation system by 2045!
Youth plaintiff Navahine with Governor Josh Green
Youth plaintiff Navahine speaks at press conference with Governor Josh Green.
My Voice. My Rights. Our Future. pix
This is Huge!
Navahine v. Hawaiʻi Department of Transportation is the world’s first, youth-led constitutional climate case addressing climate pollution from the transportation sector. Thirteen youth from across the Hawaiian Islands brought the case in June 2022, asserting their rights to a safe and healthy climate and asking the Hawaiʻi state government to join with them, taking necessary actions to meet the climate emergency and enable Hawaiʻi’s paradigm shift to a climate-safe, zero emissions transportation system. Many of the Navahine plaintiffs are Native Hawaiian youth who are already experiencing climate change harms like sea level rise, drought, floods, and fires, which have threatened their lives and their ability to perpetuate cultural practices.
In the settlement agreement, HDOT and defendants have agreed to take all actions necessary to achieve Zero Emissions no later than 2045 for ground transportation, sea, and interisland air transportation, including:
Establishing a Greenhouse Gas Reduction Plan within one year of the Agreement, laying the foundation and roadmap to fully decarbonize Hawaiʻi’s transportation system within the next 20 years, and offering a replicable model for transportation systems around the world.
Reforming the Department of Transportation’s budgeting and programming to prioritize the decarbonization of transportation.
Creating a new leadership unit that will be responsible for ensuring new policies are implemented, and benchmarks and targets are met in the time required to meet greenhouse gas emission reduction goals.
Providing youth with a seat at the table, requiring HDOT to keep Navahine plaintiffs informed, providing them with opportunities to provide feedback and input into shaping policies, and establishing a volunteer youth council to advise on HDOT’s commitments in the years to come.
The Court will continue to hold jurisdiction to ensure all terms of the agreement are met.
The Navahine Settlement Agreement is unparalleled in its nature, scope, and length in terms of an implementation plan to achieve greenhouse gas emission reductions, anywhere. The transportation sector is the largest source of emissions in the US, and the third largest globally. By reforming its transportation system, Hawai’i will be a model for governments across the country and around the world.
My Voice. My Rights. Our Future. pix
Navahine grows from more than a decade of work by 169 plaintiffs represented by Our Children’s Trust nationally, and globally to get the Court engaged in recognizing and protecting youth climate rights. Nine years ago, Juliana v. United States transformed the judicial landscape by recognizing, for the first time, that youth hold rights to a stable climate system that protects human life and liberty. Inspired by Juliana, the Hawai’i Supreme Court similarly recognized a constitutional right to a life-sustaining climate system under state law, setting the stage for yesterday’s win.
The case, built on 13 years of work by Our Children’s Trust, marks a pivotal moment in the fight for climate justice, made possible in collaboration with the community of Hawai’i, our local partners at Earthjustice, and with the backing of people like you. Our collective triumph validates the rights of youth in Hawai’i and paves the way for actionable solutions for current and future generations, inspiring a renewed commitment to protecting our planet.
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January 17, 2024 Contacts: Nate Bellinger, Senior Staff Attorney, 413.687.1668, nate@ourchildrenstrust.org John Mackin, Press Director, 646.499.1873, john@ourchildrenstrust.org
Montana Supreme Court Denies State of Montana’s Request to Stay in Held v. State of Montana
:{Ruling Statement from Nate Bellinger, Our Children’s Trust Senior Staff Attorney Helena, MT—
Yesterday’s Montana Supreme Court ruling rejected the State’s attempt to maintain a dangerous status quo—one that already harms both Montana’s natural environment as well as the 16 Held youth plaintiffs. The Montana Supreme Court agreed with the District Court and the plaintiffs that the State had not satisfied the criteria necessary for a stay of Judge Seeley’s declaratory judgment or injunction.
The state did not show they would suffer irreparable harm absent a stay and or that the public interest would be served by allowing the state to continue implementing an unconstitutional law. The Montana Supreme Court has now ensured that the Held defendants must immediately comply with the District Court’s August 14, 2023, Order while the merits of the case are briefed, argued, and considered on appeal by the Supreme Court. The plaintiffs’ attorneys are diligently preparing for appellate briefing and oral arguments.
:{Read the order here.
Background
On January 16, the Montana Supreme Court denied a request by the Montana Department of Environmental Quality, Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation, and Montana Governor’s Office to stay First Judicial District Court Judge Kathy Seeley’s August 14 ruling in the youth-led constitutional climate lawsuit, Held v. State of Montana. The State had asked the Supreme Court to put Judge Seeley’s ruling on hold while the Court considers the merits of the State’s appeal.}:
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Current Status:On June 1, 2023, U.S. District Court Judge Ann Aiken ruled in favor of the 21 youth plaintiffs,putting their constitutional climate case back on the path to trial. However, as the U.S. DOJ continues to aggressively file motions to delay or dismiss the case instead of fulfilling theBiden Administration’s promises to work with youth for climate justice, attorneys for both sides will continue briefing the same legal issues that have already been addressed by the courts multiple times. Judge Aiken’s ruling on recent motions filed by both the plaintiffs and the DOJ can be expected in the coming months.
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6 23y mail montana
June 16, the court will hear testimony from Dr. Lise Van Susteren, a psychiatrist and expert on how the climate crisis affects the physical and mental health of youth; Mark Jacobson, Director of the Atmosphere/Energy Program at Stanford University; and youth plaintiffs Olivia and Lander.
https://www.eenews.net/articles/meet-the-kids-behind-the-historic-montana-climate-trial/
https://www.eenews.net/articles/montanas-pro-environment-constitution-goes-on-trial/
[pix of flood house MT
montana’s decision to give the environment a prime perch in its constitution has long served as a model for other states. A landmark trial this week is poised to test the boundaries of the Treasure State’s promises to protect its citizens.
Environmental activists in other parts of the country said they will be paying close attention to the climate case that begins Monday in Montana court.During the trial — the first of its kind in the United States— 16 young people will argue that state officials are violating the Montana Constitution’s right to a “clean and healthful environment” by ignoring climate change and approving fossil fuel development.
That constitutional guarantee may have boosted Montana’s climate case after other similar youth-led lawsuits have stumbled.
"We’ve seen youth bringing cases, but they often have lost at the early stages,” said Delaware Riverkeeper Maya van Rossum. “In Montana, I felt confident that this case would play out differently because Montana has this powerful, constitutional green amendment language.”
Enacted in 1972 amid a national wave of environmental awareness, Montana’s Constitution puts the right to a “clean and healthful environment” at the top of the document — ahead of freedom of religion and speech.
For years, Montana law has been the inspiration for van Rossum, who used similar language in Pennsylvania’s Constitution — enacted one year before Montana’s — to topple a 2012 Keystone State law designed to boost natural gas drilling.
“A lot of state constitutions talk about environmental rights and environmental protection, but beyond Pennsylvania, there was only one other state to lift up environmental rights so they were on par with other fundamental rights,” said van Rossum, who founded Green Amendments for the Generations to advance similar constitutional language across the country.
Van Rossum argued successfully before the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in 2013 that parts of the state’s fracking law violated the state constitution, which requires Pennsylvania to “conserve and maintain” public resources “for the benefit of all the people.”
After her court win, van Rossum said she began studying state constitutions across the country and found only Montana could match Pennsylvania’s environmental guarantees.
“I decided that had to change and we needed that kind of amendment in every state across our nation,” she said. “We could not have defeated [Pennsylvania’s fracking law] without this higher constitutional power.”
She developed criteria for so-called green amendments, wrote a book and began pitching the idea. She said “people’s jaws drop” when she tells them Montana and Pennsylvania are the models for constitutional environmental protections.
Since then, lawmakers in more than a dozen states have pushed for similar constitutional language. New York in 2021 became the third state to approve a robust environmental constitutional amendment.
“We definitely looked to Montana as a model,” said Katrina Fischer Kuh, a law professor at Pace University, who chaired a New York bar association task force that examined constitutional environmental issues.
Hawaii is also considered to have a strong constitutional amendment, though it is structured differently. Kuh noted that the Hawaii Supreme Court recently cited the state constitution’s guarantee of a clean and healthful environment in a ruling that upheld a rejection of a biofuels plant.
Kuh, who sits on the board of Green Amendments for the Generations, said there is considerable interest in Pennsylvania and Montana “and the value that their constitutional environmental rights have had.”
The environmental clauses in the Montana, Pennsylvania and New York constitutions have several features in common, including that they are self-executing, which means they do not require a state legislature to pass laws and enforce remedies. That was a major selling point for New York voters who were worried about contaminants in drinking water that were not covered by existing law, Kuh said.
“It was important to New Yorkers that it be self-executing,” she said. “Having a constitutional right that simply allows for the enforcement of existing statutes would have done no good in the context of emerging contaminants.”
Not every push for a pro-environment state constitution has been a success. Bills that would have put a green amendment on the ballot were introduced by legislators in 12 states this year, including fossil fuel-rich states like Texas, West Virginia and New Mexico.
In some states, those efforts have drawn opposition from green energy developers, who say they fear potential new avenues for lawsuits or permitting hurdles will slow the nation’s shift toward renewable sources. New York’s environmental provision is already showing up in lawsuits over landfills and other issues.
Van Rossum said the energy industry’s fears are overblown.
There has been no “massive onslaught of litigation” in any of the states with environmental protections in their constitutions, she said.
Van Rossum said that because Montana officials have challenged the fact that the state’s constitution doesn’t mention climate change, she tells lawmakers and activists who want to back green amendments in their states to clearly include climate in the language.
Other states are “getting the benefit of learning from what has happened in Pennsylvania and Montana,” she said.
“If you’re clear and explicit, you can avoid the waste of time and resources on these challenges,” she said.
‘Entitlement for citizens’
While van Rossum and others argue that the placement of environmental protections in the Montana Constitution’s bill of rights implies considerable authority, the intentions of the state’s framers have long been a matter of dispute.
Martha Davis, a law professor at Northeastern University who has studied state constitutions, said the provision’s prominence in the document gives Montana courts the authority to find government officials in violation of the law and the power to monitor compliance.
“The placement of an environmental right in that area signals that it’s meant to be something that is enforceable,” Davis said.
Other states have protective language about the environment in their constitutions, she said, but they don’t always extend a cause of action to individuals. In Massachusetts, for example, the state constitution includes rights to clean air and water but no private enforcement mechanism.
Montana’s Constitution, on the other hand, provides “an entitlement for citizens of the state,” Davis said.
Van Rossum said Montana’s constitutional language has been tested “multiple times and found to be protective.”
She pointed to the Montana Supreme Court’s finding in 1999 that pumping arsenic-tainted water from a gold mine into two rivers violated the state’s constitutional right to a clean environment. The operator of the mine had argued that the constitutional protection only applied after actual harm, but the court found that the document was intended to “provide language and protections which are both anticipatory and preventative.”
Former Justice Terry Trieweiler memorably wrote in that case that the Montana Constitution “does not require that dead fish float on the surface of our state’s rivers and streams before its farsighted environmental protections can be invoked.”
The case “made very clear that because of the constitutional language, environmental rights do get that highest constitutional standing and protection,” van Rossum said.
Judge Kathy Seeley — who will oversee the Montana climate trial that begins Monday — has already leaned on the state constitution in an order last month rejecting the state’s efforts to torpedo the 16 young activists’ case.
She wrote that “the Court has repeatedly found that the Framers intended the state constitution contain ‘the strongest environmental protection provision found in any state constitution.'”
‘More aspirational’
Some legal scholars and Montana officials, however, have argued that the state’s constitutional provision is merely a guideline.
John Horwich, a retired law professor at the University of Montana who has written extensively on the subject, has called the provision “a moral statement more than it is a legal statement.”
In a 2001 Montana Law Review article, he called the state Supreme Court’s 1999 decision in the arsenic pollution case an “inadequate effort to address the meaning of Montana’s constitutional environmental provisions” and said the court should withdraw it or “otherwise repudiate it.”
The 16 youth in the climate lawsuit that will be argued starting Monday claim that state officials have breached their “affirmative duty to protect and improve a clean and healthful environment in Montana.” They quote a delegate to the 1972 constitutional convention, who called the document the “last bulwark and protection that the people have.”
But state officials involved in the climate case have argued otherwise, pointing in court filings to another section of Montana’s Constitution that says lawmakers “shall provide adequate remedies for the protection of the environmental life support system.”
“Thus, the Legislature is assigned the task of enacting laws to implement the right to a clean and healthful environment,” Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen, a Republican, wrote in a court brief.
State Supreme Court decisions since the 1999 arsenic pollution case show that the pro-environment constitutional provision is not as robust as its supporters believe, said Montana state Senate Majority Leader Steve Fitzpatrick, a Republican.
“What has happened is that the courts have come to conclude, more or less, that it’s unworkable and they really can’t develop a body of law around it,” he said.
In 2007, the Montana Supreme Court ruled in a dispute between private landowners and a mining company that if litigants are able to raise common law arguments such as trespass or nuisance, they “don’t get to bring these constitutional claims,” Fitzpatrick said.
The ruling did not expressly block lawsuits that rely on the Montana Constitution’s right to a clean and healthful environment, but it put a damper on those claims, he said.
State lawmakers, Fitzpatrick said, instead view the Montana Constitution’s environmental protections as “more aspirational and something we would want to achieve.”