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Amidst Hottest Month in History, House Science Committee Ignores Request for Open Debate on Exxon's Climate Denial
Last Friday, the counsel of 350.org and Greenpeace USA sent a letter to Representative Lamar Smith (R-TX), Chairman of the House Science Committee, after he rejected the groups' request to include Minority members in conversations around his overreaching subpoena concerning Exxon's decades-long climate change deception campaign.
WASHINGTON
Last Friday, the counsel of 350.org and Greenpeace USA sent a letter to Representative Lamar Smith (R-TX), Chairman of the House Science Committee, after he rejected the groups' request to include Minority members in conversations around his overreaching subpoena concerning Exxon's decades-long climate change deception campaign.
Decades ago, Exxon's own scientists warned the company's executives about the dangers of fossil fuel use on our climate and our communities. Instead of heeding these warnings, Exxon's executives poured the company's resources into sowing doubt and orchestrating a campaign to mislead the public on the fossil fuel industry's role contributing to climate change.
Just last week, NASA and NOAA officially confirmed July 2016 as the hottest month in history, marking it is as the fifteenth consecutive hottest month ever.
May Boeve, 350.org Executive Director said:
"Even as Representative Smith's home state of Texas is hit with record flooding, and extreme weather events like floods in Louisiana and wildfires in California force mass evacuations, this House Science Committee still has its head in the sand. Our elected officials and candidates should be supporting the communities impacted by climate change, not backing Exxon and the fossil fuel industry that is responsible for perpetuating this very devastation."
Annie Leonard, Greenpeace USA Executive Director said:
"As Representative Lamar Smith continues his baseless crusade against attorneys general and nonprofit organizations, Greenpeace and 350.org have remained steadfast in our willingness to participate in a bipartisan meeting with his entire Committee to discuss Exxon's colossal climate denial scheme. Chairman Smith's unwillingness to grant these requests has made it quite clear that he is only out to advance a partisan political agenda against anyone who dare question Exxon's potential fraud. While Chairman Smith has made the decision to proceed with his subpoena without the involvement of any minority committee members, we will only consider a meeting if all members are invited to weigh in on the urgent threat of climate change and Exxon's contribution to it."
350 is building a future that's just, prosperous, equitable and safe from the effects of the climate crisis. We're an international movement of ordinary people working to end the age of fossil fuels and build a world of community-led renewable energy for all.
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As Big Oil Fights Climate Lawsuits, Congress Urged to Resist Lobbying for Liability Shield
“Big Oil is openly asking Congress for a ‘get-out-of-jail-free’ card because fossil fuel companies are desperate to avoid facing the evidence of their climate lies in court," said one critic.
Jan 13, 2026
As Big Oil and its Republican defenders vow to fight a flurry of state and local lawsuits seeking to hold the industry accountable for its role causing catastrophic global heating and lying to the public about it, one climate defender on Monday urged congressional lawmakers to reject a so-called "liability shield" aimed at protecting fossil fuel companies from litigation.
With more than two dozen state and local climate lawsuits against Big Oil ongoing from Maine to Hawaii—and a successful outcome for youth litigants in Montana in 2023—Republicans from President Donald Trump down to state lawmakers are scrambling to find ways to stem the tide of legal action against one of their biggest sources of financial support.
In June, Republican attorneys general in 16 states asked the Trump administration for protections from climate lawsuits. The AGs suggested modeling such policy on a 2005 law protecting gun manufacturers from litigation when their products are used in crimes. As a result, no gun company accused of negligence has ever been brought to trial. Gun control advocates have been trying to repeal the law for years.
“Big Oil is openly asking Congress for a ‘get-out-of-jail-free’ card because fossil fuel companies are desperate to avoid facing the evidence of their climate lies in court," Richard Wiles, president of the Center for Climate Integrity (CCI), said Tuesday in a statement. "Congress must make clear that any proposal to strip Americans of their right to hold corporations accountable for the damage they cause when they lie to the public about the harms of their products will be dead on arrival."
The CCI statement came in response to an announcement by the American Petroleum Institute—the nation's biggest oil lobby—that fighting state climate lawsuits is one of its top priorities for 2026. API has been named as a defendant in several state climate accountability and deception lawsuits.
🚨 Big Oil wants to take away your right to sue fossil fuel companies for the harm they cause.No matter your politics, we should all agree that no industry should be above the law. Say it with us: 📣 NO IMMUNITY FOR BIG OIL 📣
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— Center for Climate Integrity (@climateintegrity.org) January 13, 2026 at 11:03 AM
As CCI explained earlier:
Communities across the country are paying nearly $1 trillion per year for damages from extreme heat, floods, wildfires, and rising seas and other extreme weather events that fossil fuel-driven climate change is making more intense, deadly, and destructive. Major oil and gas companies knew decades ago that their products would fuel these climate damages, but they orchestrated a Big Tobacco-style campaign of deception to mislead the public and protect their profits. More than 1 in 4 Americans now live in a state or community taking Big Oil companies to court to hold them accountable for this deception and make polluters pay for the harm they have caused.
"A legal shield for Big Oil could forever shut the courthouse doors for all Americans, forcing the rising bill for climate change onto taxpayers, and setting a harmful legal precedent that protects corporations instead of communities," CCI added. "No industry should be above the law—especially one with a documented history of deceiving the public. Congress must oppose the fossil fuel industry’s lobbying efforts and keep the courthouse doors open for communities seeking accountability."
CCI's advocacy against a liability shield for Big Oil follows last year's plea by nearly 200 nonprofit organizations to Democratic leaders in Congress asking them to oppose such legislation.
"Our communities across the country are suffering grave threats to our public health, safety, and economic security as a result of Big Oil’s climate deception and pollution," the groups said. "Governments, residents, businesses, and others must have access to legal and legislative remedies in order to hold fossil fuel companies accountable, seek justice, and make polluters pay."
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LA Protester Permanently Blinded After DHS Agent Unloads 'Nonlethal' Round Into His Face
The victim—whose skull was fractured and nearly died—said federal agents mocked him, saying, "You're going to lose your eye."
Jan 13, 2026
A young protester in Santa Ana is permanently blind in one eye after being hit in the face at close range by a "nonlethal" round fired by a Department of Homeland Security agent last week amid nationwide protests against an immigration agent's killing of US citizen Renee Good in Minneapolis.
According to a report from the Los Angeles Times on Tuesday, the 21-year-old "underwent six hours of surgery and... doctors found shards of plastic, glass, and metal embedded in his eyes and around his face, including a metal piece lodged 7 mm from a carotid artery."
His aunt, Jeri Rees, told the Times that doctors feared removing the shrapnel from her nephew's face, concerned it could kill him, and that he had also suffered a skull fracture around his eyes and nose and had permanently lost vision in his left eye.
The shooting outside the Civic Center Plaza that took his sight on Friday evening was caught on film and has circulated widely on social media, and came hours after an earlier protest, organized by the organization Dare to Struggle, saw hundreds of demonstrators gather in downtown Santa Ana to oppose President Donald Trump's flooding of US cities with immigration agents.
The video shows a group of protesters standing on the steps of the center, with several chanting and holding signs and one holding a megaphone. An officer then grabbed one of the young demonstrators—who appeared to be standing peacefully—by the arm, and dragged him up the steps.
As he attempted to wrest himself free from the agent's grip, one of the protesters in the crowd threw an orange traffic cone in the direction of the struggle. This prompted at least one other officer to begin firing their weapons toward the crowd, striking one woman before striking Rees' nephew in the face, causing him to drop to the ground.
The agent then grabbed him by the hood of his sweatshirt, dragging him across the ground. His face is visibly bloody and he appears to be struggling to breathe as he is dragged away by the neck.
According to the Times, another video shows Rees' nephew lying bloodied on the ground inside the building while another agent fires pepper balls at another person who approached the building, attempting to film the incident.
Under Trump's watch, a DHS agent shot a protestor in the face with a non-lethal round at close range, fractured his skull, and then dragged him around as he choked and bled. He is now permanently blind in his left eye.
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— Rep. Judy Chu (@chu.house.gov) January 13, 2026 at 12:32 PM
While such projectiles are often described as "nonlethal," Ed Obayashi, the Modoc County sheriff’s deputy and legal adviser to police agencies, told the paper that firing one just feet away from a person's face "constitutes as deadly force as far as the law is concerned" because "these projectiles can cause serious injury [or] death.”
He added that officers are only supposed to deploy deadly force in situations where they believe their lives are in imminent danger or that they are at risk of grave bodily harm.
Rees said that her nephew told her agents pressed his face into the pool of blood and did not immediately call paramedics. She said her nephew also told her that "the other officers were mocking him, saying, ‘You’re going to lose your eye.'"
"This is an egregious abuse of power," said Rep. Judy Chu (D-Calif.). "Americans have the right to protest without fear of retaliation or worse. Trump's violence must stop now."
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GOP 'Doubling Down on a Failed Agenda' With New Reconciliation Framework, Says Key Dem
"Americans will pay a steep price if Republicans move forward with this disastrous agenda," said Sen. Ron Wyden.
Jan 13, 2026
The House Republican Study Committee on Tuesday released a blueprint for a new budget reconciliation package with the purported goal of making "life more affordable for working families."
However, according to an analysis by Washington Post economic policy reporter Jacob Bogage, two of the three most expensive items in the GOP budget blueprint would be the elimination of the federal estate tax, which would provide a massive windfall to the richest US households, and indexing capital gains to inflation, which even the conservative American Enterprise Institute contends "would further distort taxpayer decisions and increase the ability to shelter income from taxation."
Other items in the GOP blueprint include refilling the Strategic Petroleum Reserve with oil seized from Venezuela, blocking federal funds for abortion providers, and a new "excise tax on colleges that allow trans women in sports."
Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, wasted no time ripping the proposal from the largest right-wing House caucus to pieces.
"After passing the largest health care cut in American history, Republicans are doubling down on a failed agenda that benefits billionaires and giant corporations while ripping away food, healthcare and other basic necessities,” Wyden said. “This legislation will eliminate protections for Americans with preexisting conditions, place more red tape between families and their healthcare, and seize ideological trophies instead of focusing on making life more affordable. Americans will pay a steep price if Republicans move forward with this disastrous agenda.”
Richard Phillips, pensions and tax policy director for Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), marveled at the GOP loading up a bill supposedly focused on working families with massive giveaways to the wealthiest Americans.
"As part of it's new affordability agenda for the American people the Republican Study Committee reveals its plan to give the wealthiest 0.2% of estates a $281 billion tax break?" he wrote in a post on X.
Chuck Marr, vice president of federal tax policy at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, similarly called the GOP blueprint "tone deaf."
"Nothing says attack the affordability crisis working-class people face than Rs calling for eliminating the estate tax for the wealthiest heirs in the country—just months after giving them a $30 million tax free exemption," he wrote.
The GOP's second attempt at a budget reconciliation package comes months after it passed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, a reconciliation package that gave more tax breaks to the rich, but cut Medicaid spending by nearly $1 trillion over the next decade, while also slashing spending on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program by nearly $200 billion over the same period.
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