LOS ANGELES (Legal Newsline) - A government watchdog group has filed a trial brief and declarations in Los Angeles Superior Court to investigate the involvement of law faculty from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) in the climate litigation industry.
The filings, submitted by Government Accountability and Oversight (GAO), follow an earlier Public Records Act request initially submitted in November 2019. The suit seeks to compel the university to turn over documents believed to be in the public’s interest regarding several UCLA professors’ alleged attempts to support legal action against opponents of their climate agenda.
“This request is being made in the public interest, and furnishing this information will benefit the public’s understanding of recent events regarding climate litigation and municipalities which have been filing lawsuits against energy companies and working closely with attorneys general also to pursue opponents of the ‘climate’ policy/political agenda," the request states.
The filing also offers insight into the Enron origins of the climate industry and describes a long history of associations between academics and climate pressure groups.
"I began using open records laws nearly a quarter century ago to explore public-private interplay following, and in great part inspired by, a revelatory stint with a Houston-based energy company in 1997, for which I briefly served as director of federal government relations (in a non attorney capacity),” Christopher Horner, attorney and former senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, states in his declaration. "I was gone from the company's ranks within weeks, about four years before it found itself in the news and its very name, Enron, became a cultural metaphor."
Horner further says he was subjected to an “uncomfortable work environment” after he voiced concerns about Enron’s attempts to take a leading role in an emerging "global warming" industry. According to Horner, Enron participated in meetings with climate activist groups in Washington D.C. and was quietly engaged in efforts to discuss "how, despite public and congressional opposition, to ensure U.S participation in a 'global warming' treaty that several months later would be called the Kyoto Protocol."
The Horner declaration also supports the notion that Enron knew the pursuit of a climate agenda could carry systemic economic risks, but the company moved ahead with the initiative anyway in search of profit.
"Maybe Enron can dodge the macro problem and have our micro benefits, but then again I have to think that a politicized international energy market for any reason will create as much or more downside than upside," said one cited email memo, written in 1999 to Enron founder and CEO Ken Lay.
The GAO declarations come at a timely moment, given that climate change debates are once again becoming front-and-center in Washington. On Oct. 28, the House Oversight Committee launched a trial to investigate Big Oil for allegedly participating in a "disinformation campaign to prevent climate action." President Biden and his Cabinet are also participating in a major U.N climate change conference in Glasgow, which started Oct. 31 and runs through Nov. 12.
The filings also come nearly two years after the unmet original PRA request was initiated against UCLA. James K.T Hunter, GAO's attorney for the case, said the university has gone to great lengths to avoid releasing the requested records pertaining to the university's involvement with climate pressure groups. Hunter says document production by the Regents of the university to date has not come close to satisfying the GAO’s request.
The records that have so far been turned over, Hunter said, “failed to include any documents that related to the specific topic that GAO said was the purpose of its PRA request – namely: the Climate Litigation/Regents Interface documents.”
Even more concerning, according to Hunter, is the fact that two subsequent keyword searches conducted by the university’s IT staff turned up relevant unsubmitted documents - suggesting that the failure to release those records “was not simply the result of an incredible coincidence.”
The original PRA request was initiated after the Vermont Office of the Attorney General released the agenda from a March 2016 “secret meeting” at Harvard University. UCLA faculty were found to have participated in the session along with activists, prospective funders and law enforcement officials, and the meeting included discussions about how participants could get involved in state action against major carbon producers.
While the initial request was litigated by the university, one email between UCLA professor Cara Horowitz and a major donor - Dan Emmett - revealed that the two were involved in a coordinated effort to take on opponents of their climate agenda.
"Hi Dan, Thought you would like to hear that Harvard's enviro clinic, UCLA Emmett Institute, and the Union of Concerned Scientists are talking together today at Harvard about going after climate denialism--along with a bunch of state and local prosecutors nationwide. Good discussion,” Horowitz wrote in the email.
Public records obtained from the California Office of Attorney General also show that Horowitz was one of the presenters at the secret Harvard briefing. According to the document, Horowitz openly advocated for climate-related "consumer protection claims" to be brought against energy companies by attorneys general. The record also reveals that the Massachusetts Attorney General's Office sent five attorneys to the briefing and subsequently filed suit against Exxon Mobil alleging "potential violations" of a state consumer protection statute. That case is currently pending in Massachusetts state court.
The GAO filing seeks the production of climate litigation-related emails sent to or from two faculty members: professor Horowitz and a second professor, Ann Carlson. Carlson’s email communications with Emmett also raised flags in a previous document release. In one particularly notable email, Carlson thanked Emmett for matching a $500,000 grant she previously received from another major donor to be used at her sole discretion. Emmett and Carlson were involved in the Emmett Center's environmental protection work, which in part involves assisting the plaintiffs' legal team in climate suits filed around the country against energy companies.
“Jennifer let me know of the incredible news that you are matching a [$500,000] gift from the Shapiros to the Carlson discretionary fund. Thank you so, so much. I continue to be humbled by the faith you have shown in the Emmett [Center] team and in me and am so, so grateful for all you do. We will continue to fight the good fight to protect our planet, inspired by you and your leadership,” Carlson said in the email.
The Regents have argued that they did not satisfy the PRA request because the emails sought are not in the public’s interest. They also expressed reluctance to reveal information about the identity of their donors; however, subsequent documents revealed that the donor whose identity they were seeking to protect is Emmett.
“The Horowitz email and other information ultimately led to GAO's PRA request now at issue to further explore the role of Regents in that troubling [climate] campaign. Each of these revelations serve both as red flags and indicators of a strong public interest in learning more about how these public institutions come to be used this way, with whom, toward what ends,” Hunter said.
The UCLA case is strikingly similar to several others in which clear ties were found to exist between academics, climate pressure groups and politically-motivated efforts to pursue traditional “fossil fuel” energy companies.
As previously reported by Legal Newsline, another document production in Minnesota showed that several University of Minnesota professors were actively involved in drafting the basis for Attorney General Keith Ellison’s suit against Exxon Mobil and other energy companies in the state.
The GAO vs. Regents case is set to proceed to trial on December 14.
UCLA declined to comment on this story when contacted by Legal Newsline. "We decline to comment beyond what is in our court filings," spokesman Bill Kisliuk said.