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Professors: Investigate Corporations That Mislead Public About Climate Change

Jayme Gershen/Eve Mosher/flickr
Jose Carlos Diaz with the group HighWaterLine uses chalk to mark what six feet of rising seas would look like due to the impacts of climate change. He’s in front of the Bass Museum of Art in Miami Beach.";

Twenty university professors, including a few from Florida, sent a letter to the White House in September asking for an investigation of corporations that deny - and simultaneously profit from - the effects of climate change. The group says the actions of these organizations have been extensively documented in peer reviewed academic research.

The letter cites the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, known as the RICO Act, which is often used in cases against organized crime. The statute has a civil and criminal component. In this case, the professors are seeking a civil - not criminal - probe.

 

“If companies are purposefully investing in obfuscating the facts about climate change but at the same time investing resources and planning in order to capitalize on climate change, I think that kind of thing implies a conspiracy to defraud the public,” says Dr. Ben Kirtman, a University of Miami professor in the Department of Atmospheric Sciences. “I think corporations that commit that kind of fraud should be subject to investigation under that civil RICO statute.”

 

The letter mentions that Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, a Rhode Island Democrat, was the one who first proposed a RICO investigation into the fossil fuel industry. Whitehouse accuses the industry of using coordinated tactics to deny climate science and to mislead the public.

 

Kirtman says he’s been getting threatening emails and phone calls since the letter was sent. He says he doesn’t want to pursue individuals who disagree with him or organizations that genuinely don’t accept the science behind climate change. He says he’s interested in “those corporations that are relying on national infrastructure, relying on free markets that require honesty, and they’re trying to disrupt that.”

 

The White House science policy adviser responded to the letter. The group didn't want to share the letter, but Kirtman says it was told that  this is an issue for the Justice Department. The group plans no further action for now.

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