Federal Judiciary Removes Climate Science Chapter from Evidence Manual After GOP Pushback

The U.S. federal judiciary has withdrawn a climate change chapter from its newly updated Reference Manual on Scientific Evidence, following objections from Republican state attorneys general who argued the section was biased against fossil fuel interests.

The chapter had been included in the fourth edition of the manual, released in December by the Federal Judicial Center (FJC), the judiciary’s research and education arm. The manual serves as a key resource for federal judges assessing complex scientific testimony in court.

The climate section, authored by Columbia Law School scholars Jessica Wentz and Radley Horton, was intended to help judges evaluate expert evidence related to climate science, including issues of causation and attribution that are increasingly central to climate litigation.

In a letter dated January 29, 27 Republican attorneys general led by West Virginia Attorney General JB McCuskey contended that the chapter placed the judiciary “firmly on one side” of disputed scientific and legal questions. They criticized its methodology and argued that the authors’ affiliations and prior work signaled bias toward climate-related lawsuits against oil and gas companies.

In a brief communication on Friday, the FJC confirmed it had decided to remove the chapter. The center declined further comment, and the authors did not respond publicly.

The move comes amid a broader surge in climate litigation, with Democratic-led states and municipalities pursuing cases accusing fossil fuel companies of misleading the public about climate risks. Republican-led states have strongly opposed such lawsuits.

Notably, a foreword to the manual by Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan still references climate science as one of the emerging areas judges are likely to confront, underscoring the growing legal relevance of the issue despite the chapter’s removal.

The decision highlights intensifying political tensions over how courts engage with climate science, particularly as climate-related cases expand across U.S. jurisdictions.

Judiciary-level climate-science recognition affects how climate-linked liability and disclosure disputes get adjudicated, and it feeds through into insurance and lender pricing well before individual cases resolve. Our sustainability-due-diligence teams help clients evaluate what these developments mean for litigation-risk disclosure.