U.S. Judiciary Removes Climate Chapter From Evidence Manual

The U.S. federal judiciary has quietly withdrawn a chapter on climate change from a widely used reference guide for judges after Republican state attorneys general argued that the section was politically biased against fossil fuel companies and conservative legal positions.

The decision marks an unusual intervention into what is typically a nonpartisan judicial resource and underscores how deeply climate change has become entwined with political and legal battles in the United States.

The Federal Judicial Center (FJC), the education and research arm of the federal court system, issued the fourth edition of its Reference Manual on Scientific Evidence in December. The FJC manual is a widely used resource consulted by judges all over the country that is meant to help the court evaluate scientific and technical evidence in a legal setting.

For the first time, the updated edition featured a chapter on the topic of climate science, which is becoming more important as the number of climate-related lawsuits increases. These disputes include those over government environmental regulations as well as lawsuits filed against energy companies due to their contribution to global warming and allegations that they misled the public about the risks.

But that addition quickly drew backlash.

On Friday, the FJC announced that it would remove the climate science chapter entirely, responding to objections from a coalition of Republican state attorneys general. In a brief letter, the center informed West Virginia Attorney General JB McCuskey and U.S. District Judge Robin Rosenberg that the chapter would be withdrawn from the manual.

McCuskey, who led the effort to challenge the chapter, welcomed the move.

“Bias towards left-leaning climate policies would have absolutely tipped the scales in many cases,” he said in a public statement, praising the judiciary for what he described as a correction of ideological imbalance.

The Federal Judicial Center declined to comment further on the decision, and the chapter’s authors did not respond to media inquiries.

A Key Resource for the Courts

The Reference Manual on Scientific Evidence has traditionally been seen as an essential resource for federal judges. The manual offers guidance on how to evaluate scientific claims, assess expert witnesses, and measure the admissibility of technical evidence.

Judges, who may not be scientifically trained, often turn to the manual as an aid in dealing with complex issues involving medicine, engineering, statistics, environmental sciences, and other areas of expertise.

The now-removed climate science chapter was written by Jessica Wentz and Radley Horton, both affiliated with Columbia Law School. According to the manual, the section was intended to provide judges with a neutral overview of climate science and to help them evaluate expert testimony in cases involving global warming.

The authors noted that climate change has become a growing factor in litigation. Courts are increasingly asked to consider lawsuits involving government responsibilities to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, prepare for rising sea levels, and respond to extreme weather events.

Objections From Republican Attorneys General

The inclusion of the chapter sparked swift opposition from Republican-led states.

In a January 29 letter to the Federal Judicial Center, a group of 27 Republican state attorneys general — led by McCuskey — argued that the climate section was fundamentally flawed and politically one-sided.

They claimed that it effectively aligned the judiciary with environmental activists and plaintiffs in climate-related lawsuits.

The letter asserted that the chapter “places the judiciary firmly on one side of some of the most hotly disputed questions in current litigation: climate-related science and ‘attribution.’”

It further alleged that the section was “rife with methodology issues,” criticized the academic affiliations of its authors, and accused them of being supportive of climate-related litigation. The attorneys general warned that the chapter appeared designed to ensure that courts would “continue to accept their views uncritically.”

Many of the states that signed the letter are currently involved in legal battles opposing lawsuits filed by Democratic-led states and municipalities. Those lawsuits accuse major oil and gas companies of deceiving the public for decades about the role fossil fuels play in driving climate change.

A Politicized Legal Landscape

The removal of the chapter highlights the increasingly polarized nature of climate change in the American legal system.

As climate impacts such as wildfires, hurricanes, heat waves, and flooding become more severe, courts are being asked to weigh in on who is responsible and what actions should be taken. Those cases often carry enormous financial and political stakes.

Legal experts say the judiciary’s decision to eliminate the chapter reflects how controversial the issue has become — even within institutions that traditionally strive to remain above partisan conflict.

Despite the controversy, the rest of the manual remains intact. Notably, a foreword written by U.S. Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan still references climate science as an important area judges will need to confront in the future.

“We live in an era of science and technology, with legal controversies reflecting that fact,” Kagan wrote. “And no sooner does one scientific field begin to become accessible to judges than another one emerges or fundamentally evolves.”

She specifically noted that courts will increasingly face lawsuits involving “artificial intelligence, climate science, and epidemiology.”

Her comments underscore the broader reality that, regardless of political disputes, scientific issues will continue to shape the nation’s legal system.

For now, however, the federal judiciary has chosen to step back from providing formal guidance on one of the most contentious scientific topics of all — leaving judges to navigate the complexities of climate litigation without the benefit of a dedicated reference chapter.