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Speaker 1: Pr firms are paid to engage in unethical tactics that

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Speaker 1: intimidate and silence Americans who are exercising their rights to

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Speaker 1: support actions that combat climate change.

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Speaker 2: Wealthy and powerful corporate entities are dragging citizens and public

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Speaker 2: interest opponents through meritless, but protracted, and extremely costly litigation

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Speaker 2: to expose anyone who dares to stand up to them

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Speaker 2: to financial and personal ruin. In its work to silence

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Speaker 2: its critics, the fossil fuel industry is also pushing for

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Speaker 2: the passage of anti protest laws dressed up as critical

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Speaker 2: infrastructure protection statutes.

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Speaker 3: Documents don't lie. While BP touted carbon capture is key

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Speaker 3: to its transition to cleaner fuel, the company privately hope

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Speaker 3: this approach would quote enable the full use of fossil

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Speaker 3: fuels across the energy transition and beyond end quote. We

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Speaker 3: also found that Excellon spent near Lady seventy million dollars

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Speaker 3: to advertise its research in alga based biofuels, but company

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Speaker 3: documents revealed that technology is quote still decades away from

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Speaker 3: the scale we need.

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Speaker 4: WHEW. Last week was a big one for climate hearings

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Speaker 4: wrap Katie Porter and her Natural Resources Subcommittee on Oversight

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Speaker 4: Investigations has been looking into pr firms and their role

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Speaker 4: in warping the public discourse on climate She had a

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Speaker 4: hearing on that subject this past week.

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Speaker 5: Rep.

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Speaker 4: Jimmy Raskin and his Oversight Subcommittee on Civil Rights and

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Speaker 4: Liberties focused the third of his free speech hearings on

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Speaker 4: attacks on environmentalists week, and Rep's Carolyn Maloney and Rocanna

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Speaker 4: focused the third of their climate disinfo hearings this past

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Speaker 4: week on climate justice and shared some explosive new documents

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Speaker 4: that their investigation has uncovered. You just heard RUP's Porto,

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Speaker 4: Rascin and Maloney up at the top of this episode. Today,

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Speaker 4: I'll look at what happened in those hearings and what's

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Speaker 4: resulting from them. That's coming up right after the break.

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Speaker 4: I'm in me Westerveld and this is drilled. The House

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Speaker 4: Oversight Committee is still waiting on oil companies to comply

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Speaker 4: with their subpoenas, but in the meantime they have received

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Speaker 4: an initial batch of documents, and some of them are

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Speaker 4: pretty revealing. Despite its constant advertizing of algae biofuels. For example,

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Speaker 4: apparently Exonmobile invests a tiny fraction in that program compared

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Speaker 4: to what it invests in its fossil fuel portfolio, and

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Speaker 4: internally company officials talk about the technology being decades away

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Speaker 4: at best. I remember covering algae based biofuels back in

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Speaker 4: the early two thousands, and scientists were saying that then

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Speaker 4: two I was twenty years ago. The most damning document

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Speaker 4: where Exon was concerned, though, was a draft policy from

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Speaker 4: the Oil and Gas Climate Initiative. In it, the oil

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Speaker 4: major asked the group to remove reference to the Paris Agreement,

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Speaker 4: noting that quote support for the Paris Agreement goals and

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Speaker 4: member company advocacy are separate concepts and not directly related.

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Speaker 4: Creating a tie between our advocacy and engagements and the

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Speaker 4: Paris Agreement could create a potential commitment to advocate on

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Speaker 4: the Paris Agreement goals. Publicly, of course, Exon Mobil has

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Speaker 4: proclaimed its commitment to the Paris Agreement over and over again.

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Speaker 4: It claims to have supported it since twenty fifteen. Here's Rep.

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Speaker 4: Maloney in the hearing.

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Speaker 3: We obtained an eternal memo prepared for the CEO of Exxon,

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Speaker 3: Darren Woods in twenty nineteen, and this memo shows how

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Speaker 3: Exxon and Chevron work behind the scenes to drastically reduce

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Speaker 3: and weaken climate pledges made by an industry called the

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Speaker 3: Oil and Gas Climate Initiative. The MIMO shows that two

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Speaker 3: companies wanted to remove any commitment for oil companies to

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Speaker 3: quote align their advocacy with their climate related positions end quote.

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Speaker 4: Both in the House Oversight Committee hearing and importers hearing

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Speaker 4: on the use of PR to spin climate disinformation, Republicans

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Speaker 4: and their witnesses made the same arguments over and over.

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Speaker 4: It's a First Amendment violation to come after climate disinformation.

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Speaker 4: Opinions you don't like aren't disinformation. Here's reporter and witness

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Speaker 4: Christine Arena debunking the idea that you can't go after

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Speaker 4: disinformation without stepping afoul of the First Amendment.

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Speaker 1: Based on your experience, do you know what the standard

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Speaker 1: practices are in the public relations industry?

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Speaker 6: I certainly do.

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Speaker 1: According to your written testimony, you wrote, quote there is

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Speaker 1: nothing standard or ethical about the practices of the PR

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Speaker 1: firms we are discussing today. What makes these practices different

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Speaker 1: from the standard work PR firms perform for clients?

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Speaker 6: You know, hiring fake protesters is unethical in multiple ways. First,

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Speaker 6: they're fake protests. There's the simulation of community support or

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Speaker 6: opposition that isn't really necessarily real. Secondly, it is not

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Speaker 6: disclosed who is paying for and funding those paid protesters.

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Speaker 6: And Thirdly, those paid protesters that I wrote about were

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Speaker 6: actually engaging in what I believe for harassment behaviors, that

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Speaker 6: is stocking Colorado Rising members as they were trying to

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Speaker 6: make their voices heard. I do not believe that there

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Speaker 6: is a single trade association in my industry that would

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Speaker 6: consider the hiring of fake protesters to be an ethical

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Speaker 6: marketing practice, and I certainly don't consider that standard.

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Speaker 4: Congresswoman Laurie Trahan from Massachusetts also tried to make this

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Speaker 4: basic point.

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Speaker 1: I think one thing that's important to note is that

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Speaker 1: we can have free speech and stop the spread of

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Speaker 1: disinformation if we stop with the grand standing and just

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Speaker 1: get to sensible policy making.

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Speaker 4: That didn't stop a whole lot of what about is

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Speaker 4: I'm on free speech? Here's Republican Representative Blake Moore from

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Speaker 4: Utah in the pr hearing.

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Speaker 7: This committee should be wary of any attempt to stifle

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Speaker 7: the exercise of free speech, regardless of whether or not

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Speaker 7: the majority agrees with the viewpoint.

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Speaker 4: And here's Republican's favorite reformed environmentalist Michael Schellenberger, the minority

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Speaker 4: witness in the Climate Disinfo hearing.

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Speaker 7: As for misinformation about climate change and energy, it is

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Speaker 7: rife on all sides, and I question whether the demands

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Speaker 7: for censorship by big tech firms are being made in

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Speaker 7: good faith or are consistent with the rights protected by

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Speaker 7: the First Amendment.

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Speaker 4: That reference to big tech firms was related to the

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Speaker 4: Biden administration's attempt to crack down on COVID misinformation on Facebook,

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Speaker 4: which somehow got trotted out all throughout these hearings despite

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Speaker 4: having nothing to do with climate as proof that the

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Speaker 4: administration is anti free speech. It's ironic that so many

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Speaker 4: fossil fuel industry allies were so concerned about the free

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Speaker 4: speech of corporations these hearings, while Rep. Raskin in his

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Speaker 4: hearing was digging into the industry's very real, very well funded,

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Speaker 4: and very effective efforts to quash the free speech of individuals.

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Speaker 4: The Subcommittee on Civil Rights and Liberties was particularly focused

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Speaker 4: on two key tactics, strategic litigation against public participation or

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Speaker 4: slab suits, and the proliferation of anti protest laws or

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Speaker 4: critical infrastructure laws which place steep fines and penalties on protests.

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Speaker 4: Slapsuits are civil suits that are generally filed by companies

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Speaker 4: against individuals or nonprofits that criticize or protest against them.

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Speaker 4: They can be extremely costly and time intensive to fight,

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Speaker 4: and thus have a chilling effect on civic action. If

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Speaker 4: you listened to our season on the Chevron, Ecuador case,

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Speaker 4: the suit filed against attorney's even Donziger was considered by

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Speaker 4: most advocates to be a slap suit. In the wake

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Speaker 4: of the Standing Rock protests in twenty sixteen and twenty seventeen,

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Speaker 4: Energy Transfer Partners sued Greenpeace and several activists in a

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Speaker 4: massive slapsuit, part of which is still ongoing. The anti

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Speaker 4: protest laws were part of the industry backlash to Standing

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Speaker 4: Rock two, aimed at cracking down on pipeline protests in particular.

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Speaker 4: These are both really clear examples of entities with more

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Speaker 4: power limiting the free speech rights of individuals with less power,

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Speaker 4: a textbook example of First Amendment infringement, unlike the case

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Speaker 4: of a company not being able to lie to the

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Speaker 4: public with impunity.

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Speaker 8: My name is Deepa Pedmanaba and I am Deputy General

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Speaker 8: Council for Greenpeace USI.

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Speaker 4: PAD Manaben testified at Raskin's hearing last week. Greenpeace has

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Speaker 4: had experience and stealing with both slabs and anti protest bills.

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Speaker 8: Slaps and anti protest bills are really two sides of

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Speaker 8: the same coin. There are tactics used by the same

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Speaker 8: corporate actors to quash dissent. We have two lawsuits hanging

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Speaker 8: over our heads, filed by one filed by Resolute Forest Products,

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Speaker 8: another filed by Energy Transfer. The first lawsuit was filed

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Speaker 8: in May of twenty sixteen, and that was by Resolute

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Speaker 8: Forest Products, which is one of Canada's largest logging companies,

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Speaker 8: and they suit us for one hundred million dollars alleging

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Speaker 8: damages from a public campaign we had exposing the company's

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Speaker 8: harmful business practices.

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Speaker 4: And then in.

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Speaker 8: August of twenty seventeen, a very similar suit was filed

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Speaker 8: by Energy Transfer, the company behind the Dakota Access pipeline,

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Speaker 8: and this was for three hundred million dollars for allegedly

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Speaker 8: orchestrating the resistance at Standing Rock. And so these complaints

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Speaker 8: were actually very similar, They had a similar template, and

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Speaker 8: they were actually filed by the same lawyers. And so

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Speaker 8: the lawyers behind these suits had actually indicated that they

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Speaker 8: were shopping this tactic around, and it wouldn't be a

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Speaker 8: surprise to see other corporations filing similar suits.

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Speaker 4: In fact, she says she's seen an uptick in slaps

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Speaker 4: being filed against environmentalists in the years since Standing Rock.

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Speaker 8: So there has absolutely been an uptick in oil companies

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Speaker 8: filing slaps over the last few years. But I would

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Speaker 8: say what's even more concerning is their attempt to create

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Speaker 8: new dangerous legal precedent through slabs. As I mentioned before,

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Speaker 8: in August of twenty seventeen, we had the Energy Transfer

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Speaker 8: suit filed. What I didn't mention is that although it

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Speaker 8: was for three hundred million dollars, the company didn't stop there.

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Speaker 8: Energy Transfer brought claims under the Federal Racketeer, Influence and

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Speaker 8: Corrupt Organizations Act or RICO, And as many know, RICO

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Speaker 8: was a law that was created to go after the

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Speaker 8: mafia for organized crime. And what made even more dangerous

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Speaker 8: was that it allowed for the recovery of treble damages.

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Speaker 8: So we were suddenly looking at an almost one billion

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Speaker 8: dollar lawsuit. An energy Transfer was alleging that our advocacy

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Speaker 8: worked to uplift indigenous voices at Standing Rock constituted organized crime,

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Speaker 8: and even though ultimately Energy Is Transfer's case was thrown

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Speaker 8: out a federal court, in true slap like fashion, the

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Speaker 8: company refiled an almost identical complaint in North Dakota State Court,

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Speaker 8: which I should note lacks an anti slap statute, and

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Speaker 8: it also named additional individual defendants. And this is the

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Speaker 8: case we continue to fight today, five years later after

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Speaker 8: the original federal suit was filed.

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Speaker 4: Green Peace has also had activists arrested under anti protest laws.

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Speaker 8: Greenpeace USA activists were arrested in twenty nineteen under Texas's

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Speaker 8: felony Critical Infrastructure law for unfurling banners under bridge, which

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Speaker 8: temporarily block shipping and brought attention to the connection between

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Speaker 8: the oil industry and climate change. And while we were

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Speaker 8: ultimately not charged under the law, you can of course

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Speaker 8: see how both tactics are used by corporation is to

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Speaker 8: silence descent.

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Speaker 4: Currently, seventeen different states have these laws on the books,

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Speaker 4: and according to Emma Fisher, one of the authors of

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Speaker 4: a new report on these laws from the nonprofit Climate Cabinet,

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Speaker 4: they've had bipartisan support in some states.

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Speaker 5: One thing that's concerning is, of course, as expected We've

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Speaker 5: seen these critical infrastructure laws passed primarily in Republican controlled states,

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Speaker 5: but not without some democratic support, and so I think

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Speaker 5: it's important to recognize that not all Democrats are holding

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Speaker 5: the line on this issue either. And we've actually seen

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Speaker 5: a critical infrastructure bill introduced in Illinois, which is a

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Speaker 5: democratic trifecta state. We've seen other types of preemption laws

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Speaker 5: introduced by Democrats in states like New Jersey, and so

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Speaker 5: I think that's something to keep an eye out for that.

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Speaker 5: You know, fossil fuel interests are they're going to work

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Speaker 5: with any one who will work with them, and they're

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Speaker 5: especially working in creative ways to get Democrats and labor

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Speaker 5: groups on board.

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Speaker 4: There's a similar hodgepodge of laws around slap suits. Thirty

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Speaker 4: one states have anti slap statutes on the books, which

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Speaker 4: enable the easy dismissal of meritless slap suits, but it's

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Speaker 4: easy enough for corporations to venue shop and find a

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Speaker 4: state without one, which is why Rep. Raskin introduced new

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Speaker 4: federal anti slap legislation the day after his hearing. It

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Speaker 4: will make its way through all of the usual painful

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Speaker 4: political gears, but it has a decent shot at passing.

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Speaker 4: Support for anti slap statutes has tended to be bipartisan,

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Speaker 4: in part because companies have figured out a way to

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Speaker 4: use them too. Earlier this year, Exxon, for example, invoked

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Speaker 4: Massachusetts anti slap statute, calling Attorney General Mora Heey's fraud

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Speaker 4: suit against the company a slap the argument it didn't work.

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Speaker 4: That case is now moving into discovery, and when it

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Speaker 4: goes to trial, Exon will make the argument that everything

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Speaker 4: it's ever said about climate change is petitioning activity or

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Speaker 4: political speech and thus protected by the First Amendment. That's

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Speaker 4: it for this time. Thanks for joining us, and we'll

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Speaker 4: see you back here next week.

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Speaker 9: Drilled is an original Critical Frequency production. The show was

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Speaker 9: created and reported by me Amy Westervelt. Original music and

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Speaker 9: mixing and mastering for this episode by Peter duff. Our

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Speaker 9: artwork is by Matthew Fleming. You can find us online

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Speaker 9: at Drilled podcast dot com. You can also find us

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Speaker 9: on Twitter at we are Drilled.

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Speaker 4: For ad free.

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Speaker 9: Episodes and bonus content, you can sign up for our

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Speaker 9: newsletter at drilled podcast dot com or our Patreon at

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Speaker 9: patreon dot com.

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Speaker 4: Slash drillt