Senate Hearing Focuses on Alleged Chinese Funding of Climate Litigation and Judicial Trainings

Sen. Ted Cruz, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, opened a July hearing by alleging a "coordinated assault by the radical left backed and paid for by the Chinese Communist Party to seize control of our courts" and to "weaponize litigation against US energy producers," saying Energy Foundation China had "funneled upwards of $12,000,000 to US based climate advocacy groups since 2020."

Why it matters: the exchange framed a larger, partisan dispute over whether recent state and local lawsuits seeking damages tied to greenhouse-gas emissions are legitimate accountability efforts or a coordinated campaign—what Cruz and several witnesses called “lawfare”—aimed at crippling the U.S. energy sector. Committee members and witnesses focused on three linked concerns raised by the hearing’s proponents: foreign funding of U.S. advocacy groups, contingency-funded plaintiff firms that bring climate litigation, and programs that train judges on climate science and litigation (the Climate Judiciary Project).

The hearing featured three witnesses: Attorney General Chris Kobach of Kansas, who testified about what he called a new wave of litigation including extraterritorial state regulations and lawsuits by local governments; David Arkush, director of Public Citizen’s Climate Program, who described climate harms, insurance impacts and legal accountability arguments for suits against fossil-fuel companies; and Scott Walter, president of the Capital Research Center, who outlined alleged funding links between foreign sources, U.S. foundations and climate litigators.

Kobach said…