WIN

neglected, see HOPE2

see courts 2 a d 3 "consistently saving our asses"

===

6 24 gmail moraNO bs //

Battery breakthrough could supercharge transition to renewable energy - MSN

MSN

Researchers say they have discovered a way to make a highly efficient form of battery cheap enough to be commercially viable on a massive scale, ...

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an 3 24

Earlier this week, CNN reported that the Judicial Conference of the United States announced a new rule that would that would shut down "judge shopping" — a tactic conservative attorneys general and conservative litigants have used to file challenges against liberal policies and laws.

The new policy requires federal district courts to "randomly assign a judge to a lawsuit if the suit aims to block any federal or state law, executive order or regulation," the Hill reports.

"I’m really proud that we did this," 6th Circuit Chief Judge Jeffrey Sutton said in response to the announcement.

However, according to the Associated Press, two days later, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) condemned the move "on the Senate floor and joined with two other GOP senators to send letters to a dozen chief judges around the country suggesting they" ignore it.

In a Sunday, March 17 op-ed published by MSNBC, University of Texas School of Law professor Steve Vladeck points out the hypocrisy in not only McConnell's — but US Senator John Cornyn's (R-TX) and Thom Tillis' (R-NC) — opposition to the rule, too.

"So why are these three Republican senators so upset by the proposed reform?" Vladeck asks. "The answer is obvious: because it will make it harder to guarantee that specific judges will hear specific lawsuits — whether individual Republican appointees hearing challenges to Democratic policies, or vice versa."

Vladeck writes:

Plaintiffs have increasingly taken advantage of these 'single-judge' divisions to steer nationwide federal policy challenges to specific, ideologically sympathetic judges. For example, the nationwide challenge to the Food and Drug Administration’s approval of mifepristone (one of two drugs used in the most common and safest abortion procedure) was filed in Amarillo, Texas — not a courthouse with any specific connection to mifepristone, but one in which it had a 100% chance of being assigned to a certain Trump-appointed district judge, former anti-abortion advocate Matthew Kacsmaryk. Kacsmaryk remarkably, if predictably, ruled against the FDA’s approval of the drug — an approval that occurred 23 years ago.

Another example the Just Security blog co-founder notes:

A nationwide challenge to Biden administration efforts to combat social media disinformation was filed in Monroe, Louisiana — where it had a 100% chance of being assigned to Trump-appointed U.S. District Judge Terry Doughty. And the state of Texas, which has filed 37 different lawsuits in Texas district courts challenging Biden administration policies*, has filed a majority of them in single-judge divisions — and none in Austin (where the Texas government is actually located) or Houston or Dallas or … you get the point.

Vladeck emphasizes, "The charge from McConnell, Cornyn and Tillis that the Judicial Conference is engaged in 'partisan' behavior rings more than a little hypocritical. The whole point of the proposal is to reduce the appearance of partisanship on the part of the federal courts."

READ MORE:[GOP represents 'most significant threat to basic constitutionalism since Civil War': historian

*Vladeck's full op-ed is available [at this link.]

win defam

On February 8, climate scientist Michael Mann won a defamation lawsuit against two conservative writers Rand Simberg and National Review contributor Mark Steyn. Steyn was once a regular presence on Fox News where he appeared more than 300 times between 2017 and 2021, both as a guest and a guest host.

According to The New York Times, in addition to finding them guilty of defaming Mann, “The jury also found the writers had made their statements with ‘maliciousness, spite, ill will, vengeance or deliberate intent to harm,’ and levied punitive damages of $1,000 against Mr. Simberg and $1 million against Mr. Steyn in order to deter others from doing the same.”

On February 9, Mann appeared on CNN News Central to discuss the outcome of the trial. During his interview Mann explained how these ideological and politically motivated attacks "chill the discourse” and discourage scientists from sharing their findings. Mann said he hoped the verdict will “create some space where scientists feel a little bit more … comfortable in leaving the laboratory, in communicating their findings to the public.”

Video

CitationFrom the February 9, 2024, edition of CNN News Central

BRIANNA KEILAR (ANCHOR) Michael, what do you worry is the effect on whether it's public health, or even global health, the health of our planet, which affects us all, when you have people making bogeymen out of scientists like yourself?

MICHAEL MANN: Well, I really worry about that, right? Especially young scientists, who see the attacks on scientists like myself, scientists like Anthony Fauci and my good friend Peter Hotez. They look at that, and that chills the discourse. That potentially leads them to sort of withdraw into their laboratories. They don't want to get involved, get into the fray, and to be part of the effort to communicate their scientific findings to the public, out of fear that they will be attacked, that they will be viciously attacked, again, by those who have vested interest in discrediting science that's inconvenient to their economic interests or their political viewpoints. And so this is a message to my fellow scientists, that, you know, that it is not OK for people to attack you, to make false allegations against you, to defame you.

And hopefully, that will create some space where scientists feel a little bit more, you know, that they're more comfortable in leaving the laboratory, in communicating their findings to the public, because we rely upon the best available science, as you said, both when it comes to our own health and the health of this planet. What could be more important than the health of our -- of us and, and our fellow human beings, and the planet that we live on? That's -- those are really the stakes here.

KEILAR: Yeah. We don't want there to be that chilling effect. Michael, great to have you.

While Mann is certainly one of the most prominent climate scientists to be in the crosshairs of right-wing media, he is far from alone. Attacks against climate scientists have been on the rise the last few years, especially on Elon Musk’s Twitter/X where many scientists have left the platform due to harassment.

mma 2 24

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8 23 BBB IRA

ro k says spent 130m$ lobbying to beat? pharma bro spike ~

save 50B/yr? ppl 3b$

https://www.alternet.org/biden-prices/ pharma PO'd

ohio super maj and all const officers? recently passed law no election in aug, then 180 to jam thru prop to derail 700k sigs fall election.

2nd big midwest abortion loss after kansas

no lnx

Ohio’s GOP secretary of state brutally mocked after his amendment goes down in flames

Brad Reedand Raw Story August 09, 2023

Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose put a lot of political capital on backing "Issue 1," a ballot initiative that would have raised the threshold for future ballot initiatives to succeed from 50 percent to 60 percent.

Voters in Ohio subsequently rejected the measure by 14 points -- but that didn't stop LaRose from issuing a defiant statement blaming out-of-state spending for the loss.

"We were dramatically outspent by dark money billionaires from California to New York, and the giant 'for sale' sign still hangs on Ohio's constitution," he complained. "Ohioans will see the devastating impact of this vote soon enough."

Many critics were quick to mock LaRose for his statement, including Rachel Petri, the campaign manager for Sen. Sherrod Brown, who wrote on Twitter that "you can't spell 'a loser' without 'LaRose.'"

Atlantic editor Ronald Brownstein, meanwhile, noted that LaRose's defiant statement didn't even mention the role that protecting abortion rights played in the amendment's defeat, which he said reflected Republicans' "uncertainty on how to handle abortion backlash."

Shannon Freshour, a Democrat who is running for Congress in Rep. Jim Jordan's (R-OH) district, celebrated the win and argued LaRose got exactly what he deserved.

"It's best to fight on the side of history, of democracy, of the people," she wrote. "Thankfully Ohio understands that."

Former Democratic Ohio candidate Paul Filippelli, meanwhile, mocked LaRose's suggestion that keeping the old ballot initiative process would put Ohio's state constitution at risk.

"Frank LaRose hates the Ohio Constitution and thinks it has a "for sale" sign on it because it... allows voters to make decisions about how our state is governed," he wrote.

And Tristan Rader, a progressive city councilman from Lakewood, Ohio, gave LaRose a sarcastic "thank you" for blowing his election.

"Thank you for your incompetent leadership on all the worst issues," he wrote. "Keep it up!"

FROM YOUR SITE ARTICLES

GOP tries to keep abortion rights off ballot after major losses: 'Can’t win, so they cheat' ›

'Corrupt': OH Secretary of State admits proposal would avert abortion rights after denying for months ›

Judge rules that Dakota Access Pipeline must be shut down and emptied Matthew Rozsa / Salonan 720

520

We’re one step closer to saving the last orangutans from palm oil destruction, and that’s thanks to you.

After more than 5 years of campaigning, PepsiCo has changed its palm oil sourcing policy, and agreed to use its influence with other companies to end rainforest destruction and human rights abuses.

This is a MASSIVE VICTORY. And Pat, it’s thanks to SumOfUs members like you.

PepsiCo is the world’s second-largest food and beverage company. By moving this snack food giant, you moved an entire sector!

Last year, during the company’s shareholder meeting, we presented more than a million signatures gathered over 5 years asking PepsiCo to cut ties with conflict palm oil. In response to your efforts and continued pressure, this year PepsiCo announced an industry-leading policy and a series of actions to tackle rainforest destruction, worker abuse, and exploitation of communities for cheap palm oil.

HOW MUCH DIVEST IS REAL?

aha recall that exxon claimed to stop $ to deniers, then kept doing, is this //?

420 srch

About 106 results (0.20 seconds)

Search Results

Politico

Oil sector skeptical of Trump plans

TRUMP WANTS TO LOOK INTO ANWR 'DISCRIMINATION': Alaska Sen. ... Citigroup both ruled out financing oil and gas projects in the Arctic last week, ... including no longer underwriting any coal projects and divesting any ...

4 hours ago

Alaska Public Media News

Wells Fargo becomes third major US bank to nix Arctic oil ...

Wells Fargo says it won't finance oil development in the Arctic ... have been campaigning for banks to divest from Arctic fossil fuels. In the 2017 tax bill, Congress ordered the government to auction off drilling rights in ANWR.

Mar 2, 2020

EcoWatch

Goldman Sachs Is First U.S. Big Bank to Divest From Arctic Oil and Gas

Goldman Sachs, one of the world's largest investment banks, gave a minor victory to the divestment movement by declaring that it will not fund ...

Dec 16, 2019

MultiBriefs Exclusive (blog)

As 2020 begins, news from the Arctic offers scant ...

There's perhaps no better litmus test for climate health than Arctic ice, which is ... to save the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) from drilling. ... and Liberty Mutual to divest from some dirty energy projects like Arctic oil and ...

Jan 1, 2020

Common Dreams

Even 'Worst Fossil Fuel Banker' JPMorgan Chase Will No Longer Fund This Way of Destroying the Planet

"For the world's biggest banker of Arctic oil and gas to stop funding new fossil ... of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) to fossil fuel extraction. ... management, the bank should be divesting "from any companies that are ...

Feb 25, 2020

NPR

As Climate Warnings Grow Dire, Energy Companies Face A ...

Litigation and global divestment campaigns ... But drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is a "reputational minefield," he said.

Dec 2, 2019

EnviroNews (blog)

Trump Admin Opens Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to Oil ...

Democrats had been able to successfully protect the ANWR from Republican attacks — until Trump's tax bill. “Arctic Refuge drilling passed, not ...

Sep 14, 2019

https://www.ecowatch.com/clean-water-act--2645821708.html

the U.S. Supreme Court ruled against the Trump administration Thursday in a case Earthjustice called "the clean water case of the century."

The case concerned a Maui, Hawaii wastewater treatment plant that pumped around four million gallons of sewage a day into groundwater, where some of it reached the Pacific Ocean, The New York Times reported. Maui County and the Trump administration argued that the plant did not need a Clean Water Act permit if the waste was passing through groundwater before entering protected waters, but the court rejected that narrow interpretation of the landmark environmental law six to three.

"We do not see how Congress could have intended to create such a large and obvious loophole in one of the key regulatory innovations of the Clean Water Act," Justice Stephen Breyer wrote in the majority opinion, as Earthjustice reported

[twt?]

Earthjustice brought the case on behalf of Maui environmental groups Hawaiʻi Wildlife Fund, Sierra Club-Maui Group, Surfrider Foundation and West Maui Preservation Association. Both the Hawaiʻi District Court and the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals had ruled against the county, but the Supreme Court case was high stakes.

"If the Supreme Court endorses the county's position, it would open a massive loophole for every polluter in the country to avoid regulation of their discharges by the law that protects the nation's waterways," arguing Earthjustice attorney David Henkin said in November 2019.

By backing up the county's case, the Trump Environmental Protection Agency was also reversing the agency's historic position, The Associated Press reported. This is in keeping with other Trump administration attempts to weaken water protections, such as its rollback of the Clean Water Rule rule granting protection to small streams and wetlands.

"This decision is a huge victory for clean water," Henkin said. "The Supreme Court has rejected the Trump administration's effort to blow a big hole in the Clean Water Act's protections for rivers, lakes and oceans."

Henkin said it was likely the lower court would now order the Maui plant to get a permit for its activities and ensure they do not damage the ocean. They have already been found to have harmed a coral reef.

Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Brett Kavanaugh joined Breyer in the majority opinion, while Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch and Samuel Alito dissented, though Alito wrote his own dissent, The New York Times reported.

"Based on the statutory text and structure, I would hold that a permit is required only when a point source discharges pollutants directly into navigable waters," Thomas wrote, according to The Associated Press.

In the majority ruling, the court did not go as far as the environmental advocates, who argued a permit was needed for any pollutants that "actually and foreseeably reach navigable surface waters," The New York Times reported.

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals had ruled entirely in favor of the environmental groups, but Breyer said that standard was too all-encompassing and would include things like "pollutants carried to navigable waters on a bird's feathers."

Instead, he argued that discharges into groundwater had to be regulated if they were the "functional equivalent" of a direct discharge.

But Earthjustice still touted the decision as a win, and CNN Supreme Court analyst and University of Texas School of Law professor Steve Vladeck said it would boost water-protection efforts.

"Compared to the argument that it does not require permits for any groundwater pollution, which the county and the three dissenting justices all argued, this result will both empower the federal government to more aggressively regulate such pollution and allow private parties to sue when that regulation fails," Vladeck told CNN.

https://www.greenpeace.org/usa/news/resolute-to-pay-almost-1-million-dollars-to-greenpeace/

San Francisco, April 23, 2020 — Logging Giant Resolute Forest Products, which has waged meritless lawsuits against multiple Greenpeace offices and individual staff members since 2013, was ordered yesterday to reimburse defendants a total of about $816,000 USD to cover attorneys’ fees and costs [1] related to dismissed legal claims that were intended to silence critics of the company’s controversial environmental record.

This is the latest favorable decision for Greenpeace in the U.S. federal lawsuit that started over four years ago. Resolute’s lawsuits are clear examples of Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation (SLAPPs) [2]. The goal of a SLAPP suit is not to win in court, but instead to intimidate defendants into silence and exhaust them of their resources. In addition to Resolute undoubtedly spending vast sums on its own lawyers, it now must cover a large portion of the attorneys’ fees incurred by those it sued. Despite almost the entirety of the lawsuit already being dismissed in January 2019, Resolute continues to pursue this SLAPP tactic in an attempt to drain Greenpeace resources and distract the organization from other valuable work. But, in this case, the bully is left to foot the bill. The two Greenpeace entities in the United States [3] that Resolute sued requested the payment of their attorneys’ fees and costs as allowed under California’s anti-SLAPP statute, most of which were granted in the court’s order. This historical award is one of the highest monetary figures ever under California’s anti-SLAPP statute.

Greenpeace USA General Counsel Tom Wetterer said in response to the decision:

“This decision shows that Resolute made a very expensive mistake coming after Greenpeace for our work protecting Canada’s boreal forest. The judge’s decisions both to dismiss the majority of the claims in this case and now awarding substantial attorneys’ fees affirm that Resolute’s divisive and bullying tactics are a waste of time and resources. The court’s decision should be a warning to other corporations and powerful interests that legal attacks on free speech and public advocacy are bad business decisions.”

an 420

voting Rights Roundup: VA Dems expand voting access and reform redistricting in historic session

420 ew

https://www.ecowatch.com/keystone-xl-pipeline-permit-2645731994.html

https://www.ecowatch.com/brazil-ashaninka-compensation-deforestation-2645751246.html

mongabay

Naira Hofmeister, Translated by Matt Rinaldi

An unprecedented court settlement guaranteed reparations to the Ashaninka people of the state of Acre, in the Brazilian Amazon, whose lands were deforested in the 1980s to supply the European furniture industry. The logging company penalized was owned by the family of the current governor of Acre, Gladson Cameli.

The conflict was resolved through mediationfrom the Prosecutor General of the Republic, Augusto Aras, after thecase had circulated in the courts with no resolution for 20 years.

The indigenous people only agreed with the negotiation because it included an official apology and a recognition of their "enormous importance as guardians" of the Amazon.

Far from the Brazil nut trees that shape the landscape of the Kampa do Rio Amônia Indigenous Reserve in the western tip of the state of Acre, the Ashaninka people realized their most important victory since the federal government first recognized their territory in 1992. On April 1, 2020, the Prosecutor General of the Republic, Augusto Aras, signed an unprecedented settlement that guaranteed reparations for crimes committed almost 40 years ago. The agreement gives this indigenous community the right to compensation of R$ 14 million (nearly US$ 3 million) with an official apology from the criminal offenders.

Their crime: cutting down of thousands of mahogany, cedar and other tree species to supply the European furniture industry from 1981 to 1987. The devastation struck a quarter of the area that currently comprises the indigenous reserve. Francisco Piyãko, the Ashaninka leader, was an adolescent at the time of the logging invasion. "What matters to us is what this agreement represents for the Ashaninka cause andhow it can have repercussions in affirming the rights and values of the indigenous peoples in a broader sense,"explained Piyãko to Mongabay.

A Two-Decade Dispute

The settlement marks the end of a legal dispute that started in 1996, when the Federal Public Ministry (MPF) brought a Public Civil Action against lumber companies owned by the powerful Cameli family. The same family as the current governor of Acre, Gladson Cameli, and his uncle, Orleir Cameli, who was also governor from 1994 to 1998.

The Ashaninka prevailed in their initial court case, in appeals courts and also in the Superior Court of Justice (the highest appellate court in Brazil for non-constitutional questions). But as soon the case reached the federal Supreme Court in 2011, it stalled.

At an impasse, an extrajudicial settlement was imposed, but it took a year of regular negotiations until both sides accepted the terms of the agreement."It was a great challenge for everyone, because the negotiation involved large sums and constitutional questions. It required a lot of study, partners and various public authorities to analyze each detail," observes Antônio Rodrigo, attorney for the Ashaninka....

dn 220 also XR win?

https://www.democracynow.org/2020/3/2/headlines/climate_activists_win_landmark_victory_in_oregon_after_presenting_necessity_defense

In a victory for climate activists, a Portland, Oregon, jury refused to convict five Extinction Rebellion members for blocking railroad tracks used to transport oil by Zenith Energy Corporation and other oil companies. The activists were acquitted after presenting a necessity defense. Valve turner Ken Ward — one of the “Zenith 5” — said of the landmark victory, “When citizens are told the truth about the climate crisis — which is the first of Extinction Rebellion’s demands — they take appropriate and responsible action, as our jury did, and we thank them.”

In other environmental activism news, police arrested members of Extinction Rebellion NYC as they blocked construction of a National Grid fracked gas pipeline in Brooklyn.

TOPICS:

great

In the most groundbreaking climate lawsuit decision to date, the Supreme Court of the Netherlands has ordered the Dutch government to cut its climate-heating greenhouse gas pollution by 20 percent, by the end of 2020.

The court ruled that the Dutch government’s duty to protect its citizens’ human rights make it responsible for taking action to slash carbon emissions, no matter how little that action means in terms of overall global carbon pollution. The case has been litigated for six years.

“David Boyd, the UN special rapporteur on human rights and the environment, said it was ‘the most important climate change court decision in the world so far,’” reports The Guardian, “‘confirming that human rights are jeopardised by the climate emergency and that wealthy nations are legally obligated to achieve rapid and substantial emission reductions.’”

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VAPING

Congress Raises Age for E-Cigs and Tobacco to 21

Jim Hightower: Can ‘powerless nobodies’ fight the corporate powers?

Written by Jim Hightower December 21, 2019

The many sparkling bays along the Texas coastline of the Gulf of Mexico have long provided both a working-class living and a valued lifestyle for generations of shrimpers, oysterers and other fishing families. People and seafood, however, are not the only creatures here, for such wildlife as alligators and snakes also call many of these interconnected waterways home. Yet, by necessity and experience, the hardy people of the water have figured out how to share the bays so all creatures can get along.

But in the 1980s, a strange and invasive new critter entered Lavaca Bay, near the town of Port Comfort. Far from getting along, this species proceeded over the years to devour whole harvests of seafood, along with the livelihoods of local Gulf communities. This marauder was not some monster from the deep but a massive, 45,000-acre factory looming over Lavaca Bay. It is the Formosa Plastics Corporation, founded by the richest man in Taiwan.

As its name implies, Formosa is not here for seafood. It is the world’s second largest fabricator of polyvinyl chloride,the tiny, highly toxic pebbles and powders used to make the gabillions of plastic bags, pipes, bottles, etc. that are choking the Earth. For decades, the Formosa plant has cavalierly been dumping trillions of these poisonous pebbles and tons of the polyvinyl powders into its wastewater — which end up in Lavaca Bay.

That poisonous content then spreads to other bays, nearby waterways, the Gulf itself … and into the shrimp, oysters, fish and other creatures living there. The result has been species vanishing from these waters, creating economic and social devastation for families and port communities that rely on nature’s bounty.

Wait, isn’t this against the law? Of course, but petrochemical behemoths like Formosa have corrupted the law, turning Texas lawmakers and environmental regulators into their puppets. When leaders won’t lead, The People must, and that’s exactly what’s happening in this case. A defiant, determined former fourth-generation shrimper named Diane Wilson, along with a scrappy environmental coalition on the Texas Gulf Coast, have just won the largest citizen environmental lawsuit in U.S. history, forcing Formosa to stop its gross contamination of the bay, the local economy and the law.

It’s good to have a happy-ending story for the holidays — one that’s not sugar-plum sappy but genuinely uplifting.

It “feels like justice,” said Wilson in early December when a federal district judge OK’d a $50 million pollution settlement against Formosa Plastics Corporation. Judge Kenneth Hoyt, a Ronald Reagan appointee, had previously ruled that the Taiwan plastics conglomerate was a “serial offender” whose violations of America’s Clean Water Act were “extensive, historical, and repetitive.” How the case got there is as important as his ruling.

Wilson, the indefatigable local shrimper, had been trying for some 30 years to get state and national officials to stop Formosa from dumping poisonous plastic chemicals into the Lavaca Bay ecosystem. The corporation’s deliberate contamination was destroying seasonal seafood harvests upon which she and thousands of Gulf Coast fishing families relied. She was ignored by those in power and then ridiculed and then demonized. Yet this lady of the sea wouldn’t quit.She kept speaking out, mounted hunger strikes and even tried to sink her own beloved shrimp boat in the bay as a public protest.

Nothing. But then, backed by a volunteer network of regional environmentalists and a savvy group of nonprofit legal service lawyers, Wilson filed the private citizens lawsuit in July 2017 that came to trial this spring in Judge Hoyt’s courtroom, finally producing an overdue measure of justice. The $50 million settlement doesn’t go to Wilson or the other plaintiffs but to projects that will revitalize local marine ecosystems and create a shrimping and oyster cooperative for local families. It also will pay for citizen-group monitoring of Formosa’s compliance with the judge’s orders for “zero discharge” of its plastic pollutants.

Even more significant than the money that the Formosa settlement provides, this victory sets a major legal precedent to advance other citizen lawsuits against polluters, requiring that the polluters (not taxpayers) pay for their messes. Who needs Santa Clause when “We the People” can deliver such democratic gifts to ourselves? For information on the details and impact of this remarkable people’s victory, go to the Texas RioGrande Legal Aid website.

Populist author, public speaker and radio commentator Jim Hightower writes “The Hightower Lowdown,” a monthly newsletter chronicling the ongoing fights by America’s ordinary people against rule by plutocratic elites. Sign up at HightowerLowdown.org.

Supreme Court Lets Stand Ruling Protecting Homeless People

1219 dn

Supreme Court has upheld protections for people who sleep or camp outdoors, after refusing to hear a case over whether cities could criminalize homelessness. The Supreme Court’s refusal to hear the case leaves in place an appeals court ruling that says the Constitution does not allow cities to prosecute people for sleeping or camping outside unless the city provides shelter for every single unhoused person in their jurisdiction. The legal decision comes as soaring rents and deepening economic inequality have led homelessness rates to soar in some U.S. cities. Click here to see our full report on the homelessness crisis in San Francisco, California.

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NJ Restores Voting Rights to Residents on Probation or Parole

USMC act

CORP COURTS KILLED!

kpfa public citizen house vote 12/19/19

house dems forced fix of nafta, djt made it worse. generic drugs [// china? there is no deal yet]

Bob did not do right on environ and labor for right reasons, but b/c of US sovereignty;

no lnx

Just one Republican breaks ranks to join the Democrats in passing new Voting Rights Advancement Act

Written by Jake Johnson / Common Dreams December 6, 2019

Just one Republican—Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania—joined a united House Democratic caucus on Friday to pass what rights groups hailed as “historic” legislation to restore and expand voter protections that were gutted by the Supreme Court in 2013.

Lisa Gilbert, vice president of legislative affairs for Public Citizen, said passage of the Voting Rights Advancement Act (H.R. 4) is a “critical step” in combating Republican voter suppression efforts that have proliferated in the six years since the Supreme Court’s infamous decision inShelby County v. Holder.

“Numerous state legislatures have undertaken targeted and deliberate steps to limit or impede the right to vote for communities of color, students, the elderly, and people with disabilities,” said Gilbert. “Americans who are eligible to vote but are denied that right due to fabricated or illegal barriers are being deprived of the full privilege of our democracy.”

BREAKING: The House just passed #HR4, one of the most important bills to emerge during this Congress. As voter suppression continues to spread across the US, this bill would breathe life back into the Voting Rights Act. A win for the people & a win for democracy! #RestoreTheVote pic.twitter.com/TR14b3ltxQ

— Kristen Clarke (@KristenClarkeJD) December 6, 2019

BREAKING: @RepBrianFitz is the one and only House Republican that believes in voting rights. https://t.co/37aqHMYIMO

— Public Citizen (@Public_Citizen) December 6, 2019

“If we want a true democracy, we must protect the right to vote for all,” said Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. “The Voting Rights Advancement Act is critical to getting there.”

The legislation now heads to the Senate, which is controlled by Republicans. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has refused to allow a vote on Democrats’ For the People Act (H.R. 1), to which the Voting Rights Advancement Act was previously attached.

As Ari Berman of Mother Jones reported, H.R. 4—sponsored by Rep. Terri Sewell (D-Ala.)—would “initially cover 11 states: nine in the South, plus California and New York, which have more recently been found to discriminate against Latinos and Asian Americans.”

“The bill would also require all states to get federal approval for election changes that are known to disproportionately affect voters of color, such as strict voter ID laws, tighter voter registration requirements, and polling place closures in areas with large numbers of minority voters,” Berman noted.

Vanita Gupta, president and CEO of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, applauded the House for passing H.R. 4 and demanded that McConnell bring the bill up for a vote in the Senate as soon as possible.

“The passage of H.R. 4 in the House of Representatives today brings us one step closer to restoring the Voting Rights Act and undoing the tremendous damage of Shelby,” Gupta said in a statement. “The VRAA is too important—and the right to vote is too fundamental—to end up buried in the McConnell legislative graveyard.”

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a court overturned a decision that would have forced the Michigan township of Osceola to issue a permit to Nestlé to build a massive water pumping station. This is a huge win for Michiganders who are against Nestlé’s attempt to suck the state dry, all to bottle water for profits.

This legal decision couldn’t have happened without SumOfUs members like you,who banded together to chip in over $50,000 to pay for the legal and administrative fees for the legal challenge.

Not only that, you saved a township from bankruptcy. Osceola Township, with a population of 2,000, was running out of options to pay to fight back against Nestlé’s water sucking ways. Until you came in.

NRA’s big loss in Virginia, explained

Gun control groups outspent the nation’s most powerful gun rights organization in its home state.

vox 1119

Virginia Democrats campaigned on their Green New Deal and fighting climate change. And won.

https://www.alternet.org/2019/11/how-a-historic-ruling-in-alaska-could-provide-a-roadmap-to-defeating-citizens-united/

Eoin Higgins / Common DreamsNovember 5, 2019

A ruling in a court in Alaska Monday could open the door to imposing more restrictions on super PACs and possibly reversing the infamous 2012 Citizens United by the U.S. Supreme Court that in 2012 upended the nation’s campaign finance laws.

Anchorage Superior Court Judge William F. Morse ordered the state to impose limits on donations to political groups in Alaska, saying in the ruling (pdf) that the Alaska Public Offices Commission (APOC), which handles election enforcement, “should reinstate enforcement of the contribution limits at issue.” The decision is expected to head to the Alaska Supreme Court.

In a statement, election reform group Equal Citizens founderLawrence Lessigsaid that the decision in favor of three Alaskan citizens contesting the unlimited donations was “historic.”

“This decision gives Alaskans and all Americans a chance to revisit those destructive decisions,” said Lessig, who helped develop the legal strategy for the case. “And it will allow us to continue to make our case that the Framers did not wish to see super PACs. Just the opposite: they would have despised the kind of corruption we have seen recently, and the Constitution gives states the power to eliminate it.”

...

919 desmog

Chinese giant Wanhua Chemical officially withdrew its plans to build a $1.25 billion plastics manufacturing complex in St. James, Louisiana, in the heart of the already industrialized Cancer Alley. The news bought relief to opponents of the plant.

“I’m glad they won’t be coming,” Eve Butler, a lifelong resident of St. James Parish, told me in a call. “I live straight across the river from where the plant was going to be built.” Butler was part of a group of residents, local community groups, and environmental advocacy nonprofits that took part in a concentrated battle to stop the Wanhua plant from being built.

win (nb many koch props ~ mass transit and alt energy

August 28, 2019

Phoenix Voters 'Say Yes to the Future,' Rejecting Koch-Backed Effort to Ban Light Rail Expansion in Least Sustainable US City

https://www.alternet.org/2019/08/how-the-teacher-movement-against-charter-schools-helped-send-puerto-ricos-governor-packing/

no lnx

How the teacher movement against charter schools helped send Puerto Rico’s governor packing

Written by Jeff Bryant / Independent Media Institute August 2, 2019

As Americans lament the current sorry state of democracy in Washington, D.C., government by the will of the people was very much alive recently in Puerto Rico, where a prolonged general strike that virtually shut down the island forcedGovernor Ricardo Rosselló to announce his resignation.

During the strike, huge crowds mobbed the governor’s mansion around the clock, closed highways in the capital of San Juan, and persuaded some presidential candidates in the Democratic Party to join in calling for the governor to resign.

Protesters had multiple grievances, but a “final straw” seems to have been a series of text messages leaked to an independent news organization in which the governor and his closest associates insulted political opponents and allies, members of the news media, and the LGBTQ community. Another notable target for insults in the text exchanges were the island’s public school teachers, whom the governor’s chief financial officer at the time, Christian Sobrino, called, “terrorists.” (Sobrino and other top officials participating in the chats have resigned since the messages went public.)

Puerto Rico’s school teachers have been a constant nemesis to the Rosselló regime, and the island’s largest teachers’ union, the Asociación de Maestros de Puerto Rico (AMPR), united with other labor unions on the island to organize the general strike. Randi Weingarten, the leader of the American Federation of Teachers, which AMPR is an affiliate of, joined in the calls for Rosselló’s resignation.

The teachers’ disagreements with Governor Rosselló started long before the release of the insulting texts.

“People in Puerto Rico felt betrayed by the governor,” says Myrna Ortiz-Castillo in a phone conversation. Ortiz-Castillo is a third-grade teacher and serves as finance secretary at the AMPR local in Bayamon. She insists, “He is supposed to be the person who takes care of the people. Instead he took care of his friends.”

One of the “friends” Ortiz-Castillo is referring to is the charter school industry. During his tenure, Rosselló pushed through the first law allowing charter schools on the island, and after the bill passed, he continued to press for opening more charters. Now it seems his ousting, and the legacy of corruption he leaves behind, will likely damage prospects for the charter industry in Puerto Rico for some time.

‘Friends’ of Charters Take Charge

Much of the teachers’ disillusion with Rosselló goes back at least to December 2016 when then Governor-elect Rosselló appointed Julia Keleher to be the Puerto Rico secretary of education.

Keleher, a native of Philadelphia who barely speaks Spanish, was effectively already on the government payroll, as her firm Keleher & Associates had been awarded almost $1 million in contracts to consult on the island’s education system. Her outsized salary—$250,000 to oversee a system where the average teacher pay is only $27,000—also created controversy.

Shortly after taking office, Keleher pushed for a plan to close nearly 200 public schools across the island, which would have led to thousands of teachers losing their jobs. She also pledged to decentralize the school system and delegate school services, terms often used to introduce the idea of charter schools and other forms of public-private education partnerships.

Keleher’s proposals drew immediate pushback from multiple political factions on the island, but barely nine months into her tenure, she got the perfect opportunity to turn her proposals into policies when Hurricane Maria slammed the island. The storm inflicted $142 million in damages to schools, and 40 days after the storm, only 109 of Puerto Rico’s 1,100 schools had reopened.

Keleher repeatedly referred to the catastrophe as an “opportunity.”

A New Orleans-Style Agenda

While Keleher worked the policy channels to introduce charter schools to the island, teachers were in communities delivering aid and comfort.

Ortiz-Castillo recalls being a first-line responder to the widespread destruction. In her phone call to me, she describes traveling to devastated communities as part of the union’s outreach effort to use its extensive membership network to identify where parents and their children were struggling and advise where to direct supplies, food, and drinking water. Many schools became, essentially, relief centers.

Keleher seemed to have other priorities.

As Education Week’s correspondent on the ground in Puerto Rico reported, she was “diving deep into the lessons of loss and opportunity in previous natural disasters, including Hurricane Katrina, which struck New Orleans in 2005.”

In a tweet, Keleher said New Orleans should be a “point of reference; we should not underestimate the damage or the opportunity to create new, better schools.”

After Katrina, a state-appointed board shut down New Orleans schools, fired over 7,000 teachers, and deposed the school board. Today, 100 percent of schools in New Orleans have been converted to privately operated charter schools.

With nearly a third of Puerto Rico’s schools still without power and hundreds more plagued with crumbling walls, leaky roofs, and spotty internet, Rosselló announced a new fiscal plan that included closing nearly 300 schools and introduced a new bill legalizing charter schools on the island.

Rachel Cohen, writing for the Intercept, described the bill as “vague,” a weakness that could invite the types of fraud and corruption that have dogged charter schools wherever they go. Cohen also noted Keleher had sought the advice of U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, a charter school advocate, to help craft the bill.

Analysts at the National Education Association had similar concerns, saying the law “left unanswered” whether for-profit companies would be allowed to manage charter schools and whether charter schools would have to serve students with disabilities—services needed by 40 percent of the island’s students.

Teachers registered their opposition to the bill by holding a one-day strike that shut down schools across Puerto Rico.

The bill passed nevertheless.

Public Funds to Private Pockets

“Teachers have had big problems with the education secretary the governor hired,” says Ortiz-Castillo. “We suggested from the very start that she be investigated. We could see that money intended for school children wasn’t arriving in the classroom.”

Teachers had good reasons to be suspicious.

After justifying her call for closing schools by claiming a savings of $7 million, Keleher signed a $16.9 million contract with the California-based Josephson Institute of Ethics to teach “values” in Puerto Rican schools—an addition to the curriculum teachers believed was not needed, especially at a time when students didn’t have adequate supplies of basic materials and textbooks.

After the storm, Keleher barnstormed the island in a relentless marketing campaign to promote charter schools at a time when, according to a survey conducted by the teachers’ union, dozens of schools still had moldy classrooms, leaky roofs, unusable bathrooms, and rat infestations.

Keleher’s intention to redirect education funds to private enterprises seemed all the more obvious when the island opened its first new charter, a comparatively gleaming facility where teachers had smaller class sizes but were being paid $13,000 more than average teacher salaries. The fact that much of the school’s funding was being provided by a nonprofit did nothing to offset the resentment many teachers felt.

“Bringing charter schools to Puerto Rico is not a good thing,” says Ortiz-Castillo. “Charter schools are a way for politicians to redirect money to their friends. The money for the school should go to the school and to the children.”

Corruption Comeuppance

The backroom collusion between the Rosselló administration and those connected with charter schools continued even when Keleher decided to resign earlier this year.

As part of her departure, her consulting company received a contract to work with a law firm assisting parties interested in participating in the establishment of charter schools in Puerto Rico.The firm also employs Governor Rosselló’s brother Jay Rosselló,who serves as “contact person” to receive the requests for advice.

The law firm’s relationship with Keleher dates back to 2017 when the Puerto Rico Education Department under her leadership hired it for legal advice and technical assistance in education policy.

Keleher’s apparent propensity to steer public dollars to friends, however, seems to have finally caught up with her.

Days before the general strike would shut down the island and force out the governor, news outlets reported Keleher had been arrested for steering $13 million of education federal money to unqualified, politically connected contractors. She is alleged to have bypassed official bidding procedures to award contracts to her friends and to have committed money laundering and fraud.

In her statement calling on Rosselló to resign, Weingartendeclared, “Rossello and Keleher ignored repeated requests from the Asociación de Maestros de Puerto Rico and the AFT to use federal recovery money to fund and restore public education on the island” and instead “diverted much-needed funding from public schools to start charter schools.”

A Lesson About Democracy

Though Keleher is out of office and Rosselló is likely heading that way, Puerto Rico’s teachers are not about to let up.

According to Ortiz-Castillo, teachers intend to meet with the new secretary of education and demand to hear what changes are being planned for the schools. They also participated in protests against a possible successor to Rosselló, Justice Secretary Wanda Vásques, who has since expressed some reluctance to occupy the position. Rosselló has recently inserted another possible successor into the mix, the island’s former representative to the U.S. Congress Pedro Pierluisi, and it’s not clear, as of press time, how teachers would receive his nomination.

But what Ortiz-Castillo and her fellow teachers want people to understand most is the teachers “demonstrated that, without guns and violence, we can hold politicians accountable to the will of the people. Now, we want voters to be more aware of who they are voting for. Candidates need to demonstrate they’re going to do what’s best for all the people and not just what’s good for themselves or their friends. We also want people to understand they should never give up.”

That seems like a lesson all Americans can benefit from.

Jeff Bryant is a writing fellow and chief correspondent for Our Schools, a project of the Independent Media Institute. He is a communications consultant, freelance writer, advocacy journalist, and director of the Education Opportunity Network, a strategy and messaging center for progressive education policy. His award-winning commentary and reporting routinely appear in prominent online news outlets, and he speaks frequently at national events about public education policy. Follow him on Twitter @jeffbcdm.

To learn more about school privatization, check out Who Controls Our Schools? The Privatization of American Public Education, a free ebook published by the Independent Media Institute.

Click here to read a selection of Who Controls Our Schools? published on AlterNet, or here to access the complete text.

This article was produced by Our Schools, a project of the Independent Media Institute.

Great: major automakers and California defy Trump rollback, make an agreement to curb auto pollution

Ford, Honda, Volkswagen, and BMW “have struck a deal with California to reduce tailpipe pollution,” reports The New York Times, side-stepping the Trump rollback of strong Obama-era standards.
The deal will create “much-needed regulatory certainty,” the automakers say, and avoid “a patchwork of regulations while continuing to ensure meaningful greenhouse gas emissions reductions.”
The automakers are referring to two things here:

- The lawsuit that over a dozen states and DC filed last year, charging that Trump arbitrarily and capriciously junked the Obama-era standards.
- The Trump EPA’s stated intention to revoke California’s power (written into the Clean Air Act) to set its own standards, which the state has vowed to fight.

California is now calling on more automakers to join the deal.
Under the deal, cars and light trucks sold in California will need to get about 51 miles per gallon by 2026, rather than the 52.5 mpg by 2025 established in the Obama standard.
“Automakers will also receive additional compliance credits for selling electric vehicles under the plan, among other revisions, the state’s air pollution regulator said,” according to Bloomberg News.
“Some environmental groups criticized the slower pace and expanded loopholes the deal awarded the automakers,” The Times reports.
But it’s considerably stronger than what the Trump administration intends: freezing the tailpipe standard at its 2021 level of 37 mpg.
“The EPA called the deal a ‘stunt,”, reports The Verge, “and said it won’t change the administration’s rollback plans.”
Background:

- Trump’s EPA and Department of Transportation announced their plan to replace the Obama-era standards a year ago, “with only desultory gestures at justification,” as Vox wrote at the time.
- The auto industry, fearing the regulatory chaos that years of litigation over the rollback will cause, wrote directly to the president to urge him to roll back the rollback, as The Detroit Free Press reported in June.

AHA, a lot of these are court wins, some electoral and proposition wins

For Chinook salmon, the urge to return home and spawn isn't just strong — it's imperative. And for the first time in more than 65 years, at least 23 fish that migrated as juveniles from California's San Joaquin River and into the Pacific Ocean have heeded that call and returned as adults during the annual spring run.

'Huge Victory' for Grassroots Climate Campaigners as NY Lawmakers Reach Deal on Sweeping Climate Legislation

CLIMATE CHANGE

https://www.ecowatch.com/grassroots-climate-campaign-new-york-2638905712.html

Julia Conley

Grassroots climate campaigners in New York applauded on Monday after state lawmakers reached a deal on sweeping climate legislation, paving the way for the passage of what could be some of the country's most ambitious environmental reforms.

The legislature reached an agreement just before midnight Sunday on the Climate and Communities Protection Act (CCPA), one of several climate bills state lawmakers have pushed in recent months since progressives gained momentum in their push for a federal Green New Deal.

New York's CCPA — like those passed in recent months in California, Hawaii, New Mexico, Nevada and Washington — offers a path forward for the implementation of Green New Deal-like laws at the state level, proponents say.

"This is going to be a huge victory for the environmental justice movement in New York," author Naomi Kleintweeted, adding that some far-reaching parts of President Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal grew out of state legislation.[n klein twet[

New York's CCPA calls for zero fossil fuel emissions from utilities by 2040.By 2050, 85 percent of all energy in the state will be from renewable sources under the legislation, with the remaining 15 percent being off-set or captured.

"By and large, this is a very big victory," Arielle Swernoff of New York Renews, a coalition that pushed to pass the bill,toldthe Huffington Post. The group counts more than 100 groups in its membership, including national groups like 350.org and Friends of the Earth as well as local organizations like Saratoga Unites and Syracuse United Neighbors....

https://www.desmogblog.com/2019/02/14/energy-transfer-racketeering-claims-greenpeace-dakota-access-pipeline-dismissed

A North Dakota federal judge dismissed Energy Transfer’s racketeering lawsuit against Greenpeace and all its co-defendants in a sharply worded ruling issued today, finding that the pipeline builder’s allegations fell “far short of what is necessary to establish a [racketeering] claim.”

In August 2017, Energy Transfer filed a Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization (RICO) Act civil complaint against Greenpeace and other environmental groups who had opposed the company’s Dakota Access pipeline, claiming that the protests had caused $300 million in damages (and requesting three times that amount from the defendants).

Today’s ruling flatly rejected Energy Transfer’s claims.

“Donating to people whose cause you support does not create a RICO enterprise,” District Judge Billy Roy Wilson wrote in a terse 12-page opinion dismissing all state and federal claims in the suit. “Posting articles written by people with similar beliefs does not create a RICO enterprise.”

The company labeled opponents “eco-terrorists” in its 187-page complaint, DeSmog reported at the time; Greenpeace responded that the lawsuit should be considered a Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation (a so-called SLAPP suit) and was nothing more than an attempt to deter legitimate organizing work.

Other civil society organizations agreed with Greenpeace’s stance.

“Defendants employed time-honored, lawful means to advance their views, protected by core constitutional rights of free speech and association,” the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) wrote in a friend-of-the-court brief objecting to Energy Transfer's (then Energy Transfer Partners, or ETP) claims of racketeering, defamation, and conspiracy. “Under ETP’s theories, ordinary political speech that runs counter to a corporation’s business interests could expose the speaker to enormous, unwarranted liability.”

Judge Wilson ruled today that Energy Transfer’s lawsuit could not go forward, dismissing all of the federal claims with prejudice (so that they cannot be re-filed), writing that “any additional amendments [by the plaintiff] would be futile.” He also dismissed the state claims, though without prejudice.

Energy Transfer said it planned to pursue futher action in state court, given that the federal judge had declined to hear their state law claims. “We are disappointed, but because the judge dismissed the state claims without deciding their merits, we intend to quickly pursue those in the appropriate venue,” Lisa Dillinger, an Energy Transfer spokesperson, said in a Friday email to DeSmog.

The federal judge dismissed Energy Transfer’s allegations of “wire fraud and mail fraud” in a single sentence. “There appear to be problems with both causation and the fact that most (if not all) of the alleged ‘false and sensational’ claims are either subject to debate, matters of opinion, or inconsequential.”

The judge’s Valentines Day 2019 ruling describes the case’s history, observing that claims against two of Greenpeace’s co-defendants were dismissed in July. Plaintiffs then added individual defendants, named in today’s ruling as “Greenpeace’s employee Charles Brown, and alleged protesters Cody Hall, Krystal Two Bulls, Jessica Reznicek and Ruby Montoya.”

“This is a huge victory not just for Greenpeace but for anyone and everyone who has ever stood up against powerful corporate interests,” Greenpeace USA General Counsel Tom Wetterer said in a statement.

“Today’s decision to dismiss Energy Transfer's baseless lawsuit against Greenpeace and others sends a clear message to companies trying to muzzle civil society that corporate overreach will not be tolerated,” he said. “It is also a check on corporate efforts to silence dissent.”

The ruling comes just one month after RICO claims against Greenpeace by Resolute Forest Products –- a case also filed by attorneys from Kasowitz Benson Torres (a law firm used by President Donald Trump) – were similarly dismissed in January.

Greenpeace hailed the federal court decision as showing that, in their words, “[j]ustice has been served.”

“We must and will continue to hold Energy Transfer accountable for its corporate behavior on current risky pipeline projects like Bayou Bridge,” Wetterer said, referring to the Energy Transfer oil pipeline being built in Louisiana, “where the company is continuing to use private security to intimidate protestors and has aggressively used eminent domain laws to secure land.”

RICO!

https://insideclimatenews.org/news/22012019/greenpeace-racketeering-lawsuit-rico-claims-dismissed-federal-court-resolute-forest

U.S. judge on Tuesday dismissed the most serious claims in a lawsuit brought by a Canadian logging company that accused Greenpeace and another advocacy group of running a criminal enterprise to damage the company.

The case, and a similar one filed later by the developer of the Dakota Access oil pipeline, had gained the attention of civil liberties and environmental advocacy organizations who warned it could set a dangerous precedent if it were allowed to proceed.

(Read: :{Industry Lawsuits Try to Paint Environmental Activism as Illegal Racket:(style="box-sizing:inherit"):}:)

These groups argued that the lawsuit, filed by Resolute Forest Products, aimed to silence legitimate advocacy by characterizing the basic elements of activists' campaign work as a criminal conspiracy.

By invoking the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, or RICO, a federal conspiracy law that was devised to ensnare mobsters, the lawsuit threatened the defendants with a lengthy and complex legal battle and potentially hundreds of millions of dollars in damages. "

"The judge's decision to throw out the abusive racketeering charges is a positive development and a win for advocacy," said Tom Wetterer, general counsel for Greenpeace USA, in a statement. "From day one, it was clear Resolute intended to bully legitimate advocacy organizations and forest defenders by abusing laws designed to curtail the mafia."

While U.S. District Judge Jon S. Tigar dismissed the racketeering claims, he also ruled that defamation and unfair competition claims against Greenpeace could continue. All of the claims again the other organization, Stand.earth, were dropped.

This was the second time Tigar has ruled in the case. In 2017, he dismissed the entire lawsuit but allowed Resolute to refile the allegations in a more focused complaint.

The environmental groups had been campaigning against Resolute for years, arguing that its logging practices were particularly damaging. The lawsuit grew out of statements Greenpeace made in which it erroneously said Resolute was logging in a particular protected forest. Greenpeace later retracted the statements. The judge ruled the defamation case over this question could proceed.

Michael Bowe, a lawyer representing Resolute, welcomed that development.

"We are pleased that the Court has correctly held that Resolute has properly alleged defamation and unfair competition claims and we will be proceeding aggressively through discovery to trial," Bowe said.

In the Dakota Access case, a federal judge in North Dakota dismissed the racketeering case against some defendants, but the charges against Greenpeace are still pending. Wetterer said he's optimistic that Tuesday's ruling in federal court in California will deal a blow to those claims.

PUBLISHED UNDER:

ACTIVISM

BUSINESS AND ACCOUNTABILITY

LITIGATION

no lnx cnbc

UPDATE 2-U.S. top court rejects Exxon in climate change document dispute

Nate Raymond

Jan 7 (Reuters) -The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday cleared the way for the attorney general of Massachusetts to obtain records from Exxon Mobil Corp to probe whether the oil company for decades concealed its knowledge of the role fossil fuels play in climate change.

The justices declined to hear Exxon's appeal of a ruling by the top court in Massachusetts holding that state Attorney General Maura Healey, a Democrat, had jurisdiction to seek records to probe whether the company misled consumers and investors.

The high court's action marked the latest setback for Exxon in its efforts to halt the Massachusetts investigation and a similar one by New York's attorney general, who in October filed a lawsuit against the company.

New York's lawsuit accused Exxon of engaging in a systematic scheme to deceive investors about the impact that future climate change regulations could have on its business. Exxon has called the claims "meritless."

The Massachusetts and New York investigations were launched following 2015 news reports that Exxon's own scientists had determined that fossil fuel combustion must be reduced to mitigate the impact of climate change.

Those news reports, by InsideClimate News and the Los Angeles Times, were based on documents from the 1970s and 1980s. Exxon said the documents were not inconsistent with its public positions.

Healey in 2016 issued a civil investigative demand to Exxon seeking documents to investigate whether it had violated the state's consumer-protection law through its marketing and sale of fossil fuel products.

Exxon said that because it is incorporated in Texas and New Jersey, Healey had no basis to seek documents to conduct a Massachusetts-based investigation.

The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court in April held that jurisdiction existed because of Exxon's control over advertising conducted for about 300 franchise gas stations operating under the Exxon and Mobil brands in Massachusetts.

Exxon has called the Massachusetts and New York investigations politically motivated.

(Reporting by Nate Raymond and Lawrence Hurley; Editing by Will Dunham)

ALEC a liability!

https://www.exposedbycmd.org/2018/11/14/how-tammy-baldwin-target-of-14-million-in-outside-spending-sent-the-koch-brothers-and-their-minions-packing

Senator Tammy Baldwin took to the stage for her victory speech on November 6th with Pat Benatar’s “Hit Me With Your Best Shot,” blasting.

Baldwin, the top target of early Koch Brothers attack ads, won big in the state of Wisconsin, crushing her opponent Republican State Senator Leah Vukmir by 11 points. She also garnered 150,000 votes more than Tony Evers, the Democratic nominee for governor who beat Scott Walker by 31,000 votes. This, in a state that had elected Walker three times and gave Trump the 23,000 votes he needed to capture Wisconsin and the White House.

By February, Baldwin had already been the target of $4.5 million in ads from just one Koch front group, Concerned Veterans of America, claiming she dropped the ball on the over-prescription of opioids at the Tomah veteran’s clinic, which resulted in the death of a U.S. Marine. The group ladled on another $1.5 million in July, claiming that she important committee meetings. Other ads by the Koch’s Americans for Prosperity and Freedom Partners groups attacked Baldwin over taxes and for “rigging the system against us.”

Baldwin used these early attacks to raise money to respond, and respond she did. The parents and wife of a veteran quickly came to her defense in an ad that effectively put an end to the issue, and Baldwin moved early to define her opponent as a servant of special interests.

Baldwin Ads Used Vukmir’s ALEC Ties to Define Her

Baldwin was the first candidate in a high-profile race that used the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) to effectively frame her opponent as doing the bidding of corporate special interests. The ads capitalize on Leah Vukmir’s long association with the corporate bill mill, where she moved from treasurer to vice president to national chair by 2016. In 2017, she was given an “Iron Lady” award from ALEC, likening the ambitious Vukmir to GOP icon Margaret Thatcher....

net neutral win!

weiner CA bill, jerry signs last minute

bezos 15$ ~ bernie bill BEZOS

https://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/monsanto-ordered-pay-massive-financial-damages-groundskeeper-who-said-roundup-gave

NEWS & POLITICS

Monsanto Ordered to Pay Massive Financial Damages to Groundskeeper Who Said Roundup Gave Him Deadly Cancer

A jury sided with the groundskeeper over the massive agriculture giant.

cody f

Monsanto has been ordered by a San Francisco juryto pay Dewayne Johnson a total of nearly $329 million in damages after he claimed in court that the company's product, Roundup, gave him cancer, NBC News reported.

Johnson, 42, worked as a groundskeeper and used Roundup, an herbicide, along with Ranger Pro, another Monsanto product, according to the report. He now has lymphoma, which many believe is caused by exposure to Roundup.

Monsanto has denied the Roundup causes cancer, but the jury, it seems, disagreed.

NBC News notes that this particular ruling does not have any direct effect on the other Roundup cases making their way through the courts.

“Today the jury confirmed what we have known since our investigation began — that Monsanto knew Roundup contained cancer-causing ingredients and failed to take this product off the shelf and protect consumers," said Micah Dortch of the Potts Law Firm, according to *USA Today*. "The company chose corporate profit and greed above humanity.”

Dortch was not directly involved in the case decided Friday, but his law firm represents more than a 100 client making related claims.

whoohoo

https://www.alternet.org/missouri-right-work-proposition-defeated

on Tuesday night,voters in Missouri defeated Proposition A, a referendum which would have allowed a "right to work" law to go into effect in the state.

This marked the first time a right to work law has ever been defeated by popular vote. It is an enormous setback for Missouri Republicans, who had made imposing this law a signature policy goal after winning full control of the state government in 2016.

Right to work laws, which currently exist in 27 states, ban labor unions and businesses from negotiating a "security agreement" in bargaining, in which a union may collect "agency fees" from workers who are not a member of the union. Since unions generally represent all workers in a workplace, not simply their own members, these fees cover the cost of bargaining for nonmembers and prevent free ridership — and lead to wage increases. Corporations and right-wing politicians, however, have painted these fees as a threat to individual freedom and sought to pass laws banning them — which has depressed union membership and wages around the country. Earlier this year, they persuaded the Supreme Court to void all such security agreements in public sector unions. Workers in the private sector, however, are still free to pursue them in states without right to work laws.

In February 2017, then-Gov. Eric Greitens — who later resigned amid an unrelated sexual assault and blackmail scandal — signed the right to work bill in Missouri.In response, outraged union workers got a referendum on the ballot to overturn it, with AFL-CIO mobilizing steelworkers and construction workers to go door to door to gather hundreds of thousands of signatures.

Republicans were desperate to win this vote, even going so far as to pass a law moving the referendum from the November ballot to the August primary in the hope lower turnout would kill the measure. But in the end, it wasn't even close. Voters rejected right to work 67.5 to 37.5.

In Missouri, workers stood up and said no to the erosion of their right to organize. And the business interests pushing to undermine unions have been put on notice.

https://www.ecowatch.com/supreme-court-youth-climate-case-2591440617.html

Supreme Court Rules Trump Administration Can’t Stop Youth Climate Case

In a glimmer of hope for climate change litigation, the Supreme Court ruled against the Trump administration's attempt to block a ground-breaking lawsuit brought by 21 young people against the U.S. government for crafting policies that support climate-changing fossil fuels, The Huffington Post reported.

The high court ruled that the administration's motion to dismiss the case was "premature."

"This decision should give young people courage and hope that their third branch of government, all the way up to the Supreme Court, has given them the greenlight to go to trial in this critical case on their inalienable rights," Our Children's Trust Executive Director and Chief Legal Counsel Julia Olsen said in a statement reported by The Huffington Post.

Our Children's Trust is the non-profit that helped the young people behind the case file the suit.

The ruling comes as historic cases around the country are determining what role the courts can play in responding to the climate crisis.

In the past two months, federal judges in New York and San Francisco have dismissed cases brought by cities suing oil companies for the cost of adapting to climate change.

In dismissing the cities' cases, the judges argued that the executive and legislative branches should determine climate policy, not the courts.

The children's lawsuit, *Juliana v. United States*, is different from the cities' suits in that it targets the government, not oil companies, for creating policies that encouraged climate change.

...

1st good act?!

e American Medical Association has voted to take on two major public health issues: gun violence and climate change. During its annual meeting in Chicago this week, the AMA voted to support nearly a dozen gun control measures, including a ban on the sale and ownership of assault-style weapons. Former AMA President Dr. David O. Barbe said in a statement, “In emergency rooms across the country, the carnage of gun violence has become a too routine experience. … It doesn’t have to be this way, and we urge lawmakers to act.” The AMA also voted this week to divest from companies that get the majority of their income from fossil fuels. Climate activist Bill McKibben celebrated the news, tweeting, “The AMA is saying to the dirty fuels industry what it said to tobacco a generation ago: You are killing our patients and we will not allow it anymore.”

https://www.democracynow.org/2018/6/15/headlines/american_medical_association_demands_gun_control_divests_from_fossil_fuels

becerra 15-0? jerry b sue on cafe 5/18

https://www.ecowatch.com/new-york-constitution-pipeline-2564902494.html

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday rejected a petition filed by Constitution Pipeline to challenge New York state's denial of a water quality certification for the natural gas project.

Natural Gas Intelligence reported: "The petition was distributed for conference, or discussion, on Friday, but the justices simply denied it."

The ruling leaves in place the August 2017 judgment of the New York-based 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which sided with the state. This is a big win for the attorney general's office and the state's authority to protect its waters and natural resources.

...

Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court has handed ExxonMobil another defeat in the company's legal battle to head off climate investigations into whether it misled investors and the public about the risks of climate change.

The court ruled Friday that Attorney General Maura Healey has the authority to compel Exxon to turn over records showing whether the oil company's marketing or sale of fossil fuel products violated the state's consumer protection law.

In its 32-page opinion, the state's highest court ruled that Healey may proceed with enforcing a civil investigative demand—similar to a subpoena—for Exxon documents related to climate change dating back four decades. Her office issued the demand nearly two years ago.

The court rejected each of Exxon's arguments that Healey's investigation should be stopped. Among other things, Exxon had claimed that Healey was biased based on her participation in a coalition of attorneys general formed to look into the fossil fuel industry's actions, and that the company was outside of Healey's reach because the corporation did not do business in the state, though it has 300 Exxon and Mobil franchise gas stations in Massachusetts.

The court also made a strong statement about climate change, writing: "The Attorney General's investigation concerns climate change caused by manmade greenhouse gas emissions—a distinctly modern threat that grows more serious with time, and the effects of which are already being felt in Massachusetts. More particularly, the investigation is premised on the Attorney General's belief that Exxon may have misled Massachusetts residents about the impact of fossil fuels on both the Earth's climate and the value of the company."

A spokesman for Exxon did not respond to a request for comment.

...

https://insideclimatenews.org/news/13042018/exxon-climate-change-investigation-massachusetts-supreme-court-ruling-refuses-block-attorney-general-healey

apr 13

https://www.ecowatch.com/exxon-climate-lawsuit-2554739359.html

Court Tosses Exxon's 'Implausible' Lawsuit Seeking to Stop Climate Probe

A federal judge on Thursday threw out Exxon Mobil's lawsuit that sought to derail New York and Massachusetts' probe into whether the oil giant misled investors and the public about its knowledge of climate change.

Exxon tried to convince U.S. District Court Judge Valerie A. Caproni that New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman and Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey were infringing on the company's free speech rights and the AGs were pursuing politically motivated investigations.

But in a searing ruling, Caproni called the company's claims "implausible" and "a wild stretch of logic."

"The relief requested by Exxon in this case is extraordinary: Exxon has asked two federal courts—first in Texas, now in New York—to stop state officials from conducting duly-authorized investigations into potential fraud," she wrote. "It has done so on the basis of extremely thin allegations and speculative inferences."

Exxon's allegations rested on statements made at the AGs' United for Clean Power in March 2016. The company tried to paint Schneiderman and Healey's participation in the event as a evidence of their political bias against the company.

However, Caproni dismissed that argument, which she considered a result of "cherry-picking snippets from the transcript of the press conference."

"Some statements made at the press conference were perhaps hyperbolic, but nothing that was said can fairly be read to constitute declaration of a political vendetta against Exxon," she wrote.

The company's claims that the AGs "are pursuing bad faith investigations in order to violate Exxon's constitutional rights are implausible," the judge continued. She called it a "a wild stretch of logic" for Exxon to contend that the AGs' comments about public confusion relative to climate change showed any intent to "chill dissenting speech."

Caproni dismissed the lawsuit with prejudice, meaning Exxon cannot file it again.

Schneiderman and Healey celebrated the ruling.

"I am pleased with the court's decision to dismiss Exxon's frivolous, nonsensical lawsuit that wrongfully attempted to thwart a serious state law enforcement investigation into the company," Schneiderman said.

...

https://www.ecowatch.com/ireland-fossil-fuels-2532749165.html

https://www.ecowatch.com/coal-mining-jobs-us-2532209397.html

West's Largest Coal-Fired Power Plant Confirms Shutdown Plan, Miners Fight to Save Jobs

Coal miners and supporters, many of them members of the Navajo and Hopi tribes, rallied in Phoenix Tuesday to protest the impending shutdown of the West's largest coal-fired power plant.

While Interior Sec. Ryan Zinke expressed his continued support for keeping the Navajo Generating Station open in a brief statement Tuesday, owners of the plant say they still are planning to take it offline in 2019 due to price pressures from natural gas.

The future of the plant, which provides more than 800 jobs to primarily Navajo and Hopi workers as well as tribal royalties, has proved a flash point for national and regional energy policy and raised larger questions on how Native communities will handle ties to fossil fuel industries as the economy changes. "I understand, we understand, you understand the challenges," Navajo Nation Council Speaker LoRenzo Bates said in a speech at the rally. "There's your jobs, the revenue, the economy, the water, but it goes beyond that. If NGS does shut down ... those jobs are going to be very hard to replace."

odd rare win?

https://www.ecowatch.com/trump-suspends-pebble-mine-2529694490.html

...The unexpected move from President Trump's pro-business administration was a blow to Pebble Limited Partnership, a subsidiary of Canadian mining company Northern Dynasty Minerals. The mine developer is proposing to extract one of the world's largest copper and gold deposits from the pristine watershed. Shares fell as much as 26 percent on Monday following the EPA's surprise decision.

The Obama EPA in 2014 proposed to block the project under the Clean Water Act but the plan was never finalized after a federal court put a hold on the process.

Last year, the EPA started a process to reverse the decision, and Pebble submitted its first permit application to build the mine last month. But the EPA received more than one million comments from interested stakeholders, most that were fiercely opposed to withdrawing the earlier proposed protections. More than 65 percent of Alaskans, 80 percent of Bristol Bay residents and Native communities, and 85 percent of commercial fishermen oppose the mine.

Joel Reynolds, the western director and senior attorney the Natural Resources Defense Council noted, "The Bristol Bay fishery is the economic and cultural heart and soul of the region, producing last summer alone some 60 million wild salmon. Every year it generates an estimated $1.5 billion in revenue, supporting some 14,000 jobs in a region that depends on that economic engine for its very survival. According to EPA's own comprehensive assessment of risk, the Pebble Mine's impact on the region could be 'catastrophic.'"

EPA administrator Scott Pruitt said Friday, "We have restored process, reviewed comments, and heard from a variety of stakeholders on whether to withdraw the proposed restrictions in the Bristol Bay watershed."

"Based on that review, it is my judgment at this time that any mining projects in the region likely pose a risk to the abundant natural resources that exist there. Until we know the full extent of that risk, those natural resources and world-class fisheries deserve the utmost protection."

...

dingdong!

https://insideclimatenews.org/news/29012018/kathleen-hartnett-white-climate-denial-nomination-trump-ceq-trouble

Update: The White House [withdrew White's nomination in early February.]

Kathleen Hartnett White, the former Texas regulator who has extolled the social benefits of carbon dioxide and asserted that coal helped end slavery, faces a difficult road to Senate confirmation as top White House environmental adviser, according to lobbyists and Capitol Hill sources.

They say that White, still awaiting a committee vote that has yet to be scheduled, is the most endangered of President Donald Trump's environmental nominees. Her embattled bid to chair the Council on Environmental Quality underscores larger problems for the White House in filling key roles throughout the federal government.

Although Trump already lags behind his three immediate predecessorsboth in making nominations and having them confirmed, he assured himself further fights by doubling down on 75 controversial nominees that the Senate returned to the White House for reconsideration before the December recess.

Trump sent the names, including White's, right back to the Senate, where he now has one fewer Republican vote to count on, since the election of Democratic Sen. Doug Jones of Alabama. If Democrats stick together, it would only take two GOP defections to sink any nominee. Environmental groups are working on swaying at least a half-dozen Republican senators who may be wavering due to White's past stances on issues important in their home states—including ethanol, renewable energy and radiation contamination in water.

The League of Conservation Voters says it has volunteers working in three key states to encourage constituents to urge their senators to oppose White's nomination: Maine, Montana and Nevada. LCV's Latino organizing affiliate, Chispa, also has been speaking out against White in Arizona. "Kathleen Hartnett White is laughably unqualified," said Sara Jordan, LCV's legislative representative. "She's an anti-science zealot with a long record of distorting science, spouting conspiracy theories and denying serious pollution problems in Texas."

Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, who has the strongest environmental voting record among Senate Republicans, was the only GOP senator who voted against confirmation of Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt and against the sole assistant administrator approved so far: William Wehrum, a former fossil fuel and chemical industry lawyer who now runs the agency's air office. Collins office did not respond to queries from InsideClimate News on her stance on White. Collins told E&E Daily earlier this month that she had "seen some excerpts" from White's confirmation hearing but had not yet seen the whole thing. "So I don't know whether they were in context or whether they represent how the hearing went in general," Collins said.

Sen. Tom Carper of Delaware, the highest ranking Democrat on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, said: "In the 17 years I have been in the Senate, I have never sat through a hearing as excruciating as Ms. White's."

White's View of CO2: 'The Gas of Life'

https://www.ecowatch.com/new-york-fossil-fuel-divestment-2524494059.html

no lnx

Empire State Building Shines Green After NYC's Decision to Take on Fossil Fuel Industry

New York City's iconic Empire State Building glowed green Wednesday night following two "watershed" announcements-that the city would seek to divest its pension funds from fossil fuel investments, and that it filed suit against five oil giants for contributing to climate change.

"The Empire State Building is shining green tonight because it's time to put our planet first. #DivestNY," Democratic Mayor Bill de Blasio tweeted Wednesday.

350.org co-founder Bill McKibben, a major campaigner in the global divestment movement, remarked in a tweet about the green lighting, "Just this once I think it's worth the carbon!"

The Belgium-based European Green Party also chimed in and advocated for European leaders to follow the Big Apple's footsteps.

"Let's join #DivestNY and #DivestEurope for a Green and sustainable future for us and generations to come," the party said on social media.

The divestment movement has grown in the U.S. and around the world. In November, Norway proposed to sell off all of its shares (about $35 billion) in oil and natural gas holdings.

Mayor de Blasio and Comptroller Scott Stringer said they intend to divest New York City's $5 billion in securities of over 190 fossil fuel companies.

New York's lawsuit, filed in federal court, names BP, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, Exxon Mobil and Royal Dutch Shell as defendants. The city seeks billions of dollars in damages and alleges the fossil fuel industry knew for decades that burning fuels drives global warming.

Environmentalists cheered the city's historic announcement.

"Today was an incredible day," author and investigative journalist Naomi Klein tweeted. "Hearing the mayor of the biggest city in the richest country on earth announce a lawsuit against 5 oil majors for climate damages AND fossil fuel divestment? Wow. We needed this. We will build on it."

...

Buoyed by the British Labour Party election gains this week, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders on Saturday urged a summit of progressive activists who propelled his presidential candidacy to ramp up efforts to win elections and help remake a Democratic Party he deemed a failure.

"They won those seats by standing up to the ruling class," he said, referring to the British elections and citing wins by progressive US candidates in several state and local races while writing off losses as evidence liberal progressives could still be competitive even in conservative states.

But Mr Sanders, who lost the Democratic nomination nearly a year ago to Hillary Clinton, showed little interest in a push by "Draft Bernie" activists who want him to start his own "People's Party." Many activists blame establishment Democrats for losing to President Donald Trump by failing to embrace a more populist left-leaning agenda.

Jeremy Corbyn's election performance inspires Bernie Sanders followers

Sanders headlined the three-day "People's Summit" in Chicago, attended by celebrity activists including actors Danny Glover and John Cusack, which brought together main progressive groups such as National Nurses United, Democratic Socialists of America and People for Bernie.

Many activists said they hoped to transform the momentum from recent protests such as January'sWomen's March in Washington into concrete plans to support a growing wave of grassroots candidates to secure electoral power.

"We could have 10,000 people marching, but if we don't have some means of translating that into winning political office

and enacting a legislative progressive agenda, at the end of the day, what does it amount to?" said Nick Brana, the former staffer for the Sanders campaign leading the "Draft Bernie" group.

Bernie Sanders says Labour party shows the way to beat Donald ...

www.independent.co.uk › News › World › Americas › US politics

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:{Jun 11, 2017 - Buoyed by the British Labour Party election gains this week, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders on Saturday urged a summit of progressive activists who propelled his presidential candidacy to ramp up efforts to win elections and help remake a Democratic Party he deemed a failure.:(style="word-wrap:break-word"):}:

UK election: Bernie Sanders congratulates Jeremy Corbyn, saying he ...

www.independent.co.uk › News › UK › UK Politics

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:{Jun 9, 2017 - Bernie Sanders has congratulated Jeremy Corbyn after Labour exceeded expectations in the general election and looks to be on course to increase its number of parliamentary seats. The former Democratic ... Projections suggest the party is on course to receive 40 per cent of the vote, giving it 265 seats.:(style="word-wrap:break-word"):}:

===

small mercies: 2 judges ABA blogger grassly veto?

Dourson is the second controversial nominee to withdraw in as many months. Sam Clovis, a former Trump campaign aide, climate change "skeptic" and conservative radio talk show host, withdrew from consideration for Chief Scientist at USDA

win

https://insideclimatenews.org/news/16102017/climate-change-activists-arrest-pipeline-shutdown-necessity-defense

A judge in Minnesota has cleared the way for an unusual and potentially groundbreaking defense, allowing climate activists to use the "necessity" of confronting the climate crisis as justification for temporarily shutting down two crude oil pipelines last year.

Robert Tiffany, a district court judge in Clearwater County, Minnesota, ruled on Oct. 11 that three activists who were arrested and charged with felonies last year can argue that they violated the law in order to protect citizens from the impacts of global warming and that they had no legal alternative.

"It is extremely unusual for a court to allow presentation of the necessity defense by environmental protesters," said Michael Gerrard, director of the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia University. "It will be fascinating to see how this trial goes and how much evidence the court allows."

The ruling is the third recent case in which a judge in the United States has allowed for such a defense in a climate case in a jury trial. A case in Massachusetts in 2014 did not go to trial afterthe prosecutor dropped the charges. A judge allowed the necessity defense in a Washington State case in 2016 but then instructed jurors theycould not acquit on necessity. There was also a recent non-jury case in which a county judge in Slate Hill, New York, allowed a necessity defense for climate activists charged with misdemeanor trespassing, but he issued a guilty verdict in June, stating the defense failed to prove "imminence", or immediate harm posed by climate change.

In the Minnesota case, Emily Johnston, Annette Klapstein and Benjamin Joldersma are charged with felonies over the shutdown of two pipelines there on Oct. 11, 2016. A fourth defendant, Steven Liptay, who filmed the pipeline shutdowns, is charged with two gross misdemeanors.

Enbridge Inc., the Canadian company that owns and operates the two pipelines, said at the time of the shutdowns that the actions were "reckless and dangerous" and that the company would "support the prosecution of all those involved," according to news reports.

An Unusual Legal Tactic for Protesters

Use of a necessity defense is typically used not for protests but for more clear cut cases of individuals intentionally committing a crime to prevent imminent danger, such as breaking into a house where someone is being held hostage, Gerrard said.

Political activists have, however, used the necessity defense in the past in opposition to issues including the Vietnam War, nuclear weapons and abortion.

The defense tactic is widely seen as an attempt to focus attention on controversial government policies by forcing jurors to pass judgment on the morality of such policies and of individuals' resistance to them.

The pipeline shutdowns in Minnesota were part of a multi-state protest by the group Climate Direct Action to protest the flow of tar sands crude into the U.S., and to show solidarity with the Dakota Access pipeline protests in North Dakota.

A Greater Risk than Climate Change?

"I think it's a sensible ruling that will allow the jurors to take into consideration all of the information that they really need to rule on this case properly," Marla Marcum, director of the Climate Disobedience Center, said.

Marcum's group is collaborating with the defendants in the Minnesota case and other "valve turner" cases on trial strategy.

Ken Ward, who shut down a pipeline in Washington state, was convicted of second-degree burglary in June and received30 days of community service. Activists who shut down a pipeline in North Dakota were convicted on felony charges earlier this month and are awaiting sentencing. Activists in Montana are still awaiting trial for a similar act.

The case in Minnesota may center around whether the actions taken by the protestors—shutting down valves on an active pipeline—presented an equal or greater risk than that posed by climate change.

"You are getting close to threats to public health, welfare, safety, when you start actually damaging the infrastructure itself," Patrick Parenteau, an environmental law professor at Vermont Law School said.

"The equation here is, did the defendants take action appropriate to draw attention to the problem, or does the balance tip against them and in favor of protecting public health and safety. The prosecutor will probably put people on the stand who will say, this is dangerous," Parenteau said.

Soon after the pipeline shutdowns last fall, Carl Weimer of the Pipeline Safety Trust, an industry watchdog, characterized the activity as a "dangerous stunt" according to news reports. Marcum said that in each case, pipeline operators were notified of the valve closures several minutes before they occurred so the companies could shut down the compressors that pump the oil through the pipes to safely shut the pipelines down.

Courts Are Considering Climate Risk

In his ruling, Judge Tiffany stated that Minnesota's standard for the necessity defense is high: "To successfully assert the defense, a criminal defendant must show that the harm that would have resulted from obeying the law would have significantly exceeded the harm actually caused by breaking the law, there was no legal alternative to breaking the law, the defendant was in danger of imminent physical harm, and there was a direct causal connection between breaking the law and preventing the harm."

Gerrard said the decision to allow a necessity defense may be part of a growing awareness in the courts of the risks of climate change, including recent rulings on coal leases and natural gas pipelines, that went in favor of closer scrutiny of environmental considerations.

"What we are seeing in some courts is there is such frustration at the failure of the executive and legislative branches to act on climate change that some courts are becoming willing to step in," he said.

PUBLISHED UNDER:

ACTIVISM

all in courts lately (exxon beat team blue, claude w]

https://www.ecowatch.com/earthjustice-roadless-rule-2490941377.html

Battle to Protect 50 Million Forest Acres May Finally Be Won After 16 Years

By Jessica A. Knoblauch

A decades-long fight over a landmark rule protecting wild forests nationwide took another successful–and possibly final–turn last week after a U.S. district court threw out a last-ditch attack by the state of Alaska against the Roadless Rule.

Adopted in the closing days of the Clinton administration, the Roadless Rule prohibits most logging and road construction in roadless areas of national forests. These lands, today equaling about 50 million acres or about the size of Nebraska, are some of the wildest places left in America.

Upon its passage, the rule was overwhelmingly popular with the American people, including those who like to hike, camp, fish and recreate among the trees in wild, unmarred areas. The Forest Service also liked the rule, since, at the time, the agency had a multibillion-dollar backlog on maintenance for more than 400,000 miles of existing roads, and it wasn't eager to add even more to its workload.

Yet, despite its popularity, state political leaders with ties to the logging and timber industries hated the new rule. Even before President Clinton left office, they began their attack. The Bush administration, which took office just eight days later, failed to come to the rule's defense.

"It created this vacuum," said Earthjustice attorney Tom Waldo, one of the legal architects of the organization's Roadless Rule strategy. "So Earthjustice stepped in."

...

8/17 win

EPA Reverses Decision to Delay Obama-Era Ozone Regulation After 15 States Sue

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Scott Pruitt reversed course on plans to delay an Obama-era ozone pollution regulation, announcing Wednesday that EPA would comply with the rule's original Oct. 1 deadline.

The move comes a day after 15 states and the District of Columbia filed suit against EPA for the delay, claiming that Pruitt's original plan to put a one-year stay on implementation would endanger "the health and safety of millions."

https://www.ecowatch.com/epa-ozone-pollution-2468656270.html

http://www.ecowatch.com/maryland-bans-fracking-2333222930.html

Frogs Made Famous by Mark Twain Are Finally Laying Eggs Againalso Rare Species Discovered Breeding in Santa Monica Mountains, also Yosemite see Amphibians 3/17.

3/16

Obama to Limit Arctic, Atlantic Offshore Oil Drilling as Part of New Five-Year Plan

Virtually all of the Arctic and much of the Atlantic coast of the U.S. will become...

WIN

Judge rules that Dakota Access Pipeline must be shut down and emptiedMatthew Rozsa / Salonan 720

A Two-Decade Dispute

great

Congress Raises Age for E-Cigs and Tobacco to 21

NRA’s big loss in Virginia, explained

Virginia Democrats campaigned on their Green New Deal and fighting climate change. And won.

'Huge Victory' for Grassroots Climate Campaigners as NY Lawmakers Reach Deal on Sweeping Climate Legislation

Baldwin Ads Used Vukmir’s ALEC Ties to Define Her

Monsanto Ordered to Pay Massive Financial Damages to Groundskeeper Who Said Roundup Gave Him Deadly Cancer

Court Tosses Exxon's 'Implausible' Lawsuit Seeking to Stop Climate Probe

West's Largest Coal-Fired Power Plant Confirms Shutdown Plan, Miners Fight to Save Jobs

White's View of CO2: 'The Gas of Life'

Bernie Sanders says Labour party shows the way to beat Donald ...

UK election: Bernie Sanders congratulates Jeremy Corbyn, saying he ...

An Unusual Legal Tactic for Protesters

A Greater Risk than Climate Change?

Courts Are Considering Climate Risk

Battle to Protect 50 Million Forest Acres May Finally Be Won After 16 Years

EPA Reverses Decision to Delay Obama-Era Ozone Regulation After 15 States Sue

Obama to Limit Arctic, Atlantic Offshore Oil Drilling as Part of New Five-Year Plan

Judge rules that Dakota Access Pipeline must be shut down and emptied Matthew Rozsa / Salonan 720