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Trump EPA and Citibank Sued for 'Illegally' Freezing Green Energy Funds
"This program was designed to save money for hard-working Americans who are struggling to pay for groceries and keep the lights on," said the head of a climate group that had been awarded funds to finance green energy expansion.
Mar 10, 2025
The need for a federal lawsuit filed Monday presents "more evidence of a constitutional crisis," according to one campaigner, as plaintiffs pushed back against the Trump administration's unlawful freezing of funds appropriated by Congress to help fuel a green energy transition in marginalized communities nationwide.
The lawsuit was announced Saturday by Climate United Fund, a nonprofit green investment fund, and was received Monday by U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan, who previously presided over President Donald Trump's criminal trial regarding his alleged attempts to overturn the 2020 election.
The group is accusing the Environmental Protection Agency and Citibank of "illegally withholding" $7 billion that had been awarded to Climate United through the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), which set up a $20 billion Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, also known as the Green Bank.
The Green Bank was established to fund solar power, energy-efficient housing projects, and electric vehicles. Climate United has reported that it used funds to begin pre-construction on a solar energy project across the University of Arkansas system, invest in electric trucks at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach with plans for nationwide expansion, and launch a grant program for low-income communities to start clean energy projects.
For the last two weeks, The New York Times reported, Climate United and seven other nonprofits that were awarded funding through the Green Bank have been unable to withdraw the money from their accounts at Citibank.
"They have essentially acted as if they control the power of the purse, but very clearly written into the Constitution is the separation of powers that grants Congress and Congress alone the power of making funding decisions."
The Times reported that the EPA appeared to have frozen the funds after EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin called for a "termination" of the agreement the Biden administration made with Citibank when the money was allocated to the nonprofits.
Zeldin made that demand last month after the right-wing group Project Veritas, released a hidden-camera video in which it had surreptitiously recorded an EPA employee saying before Trump took office that the agency was attempting to spend federal money on climate programs before the Republican president was inaugurated.
Zeldin suggested the comments signaled the Green Bank was "designed to obligate all of the money in a rush job with reduced oversight" and was "irresponsibly shoveling boat loads of cash to far-left, activist groups in the name of environmental justice and climate equity."
Climate United and the other groups impacted by the funding freeze have been struggling to pay their staff, the Times reported.
"This isn't about politics; it's about economics," said Beth Bafford, CEO of Climate United. "This program was designed to save money for hard-working Americans who are struggling to pay for groceries and keep the lights on. We're going to court for the communities we serve—not because we want to, but because we have to."
In his statement about the Green Bank funding last month, Zeldin said he was referring the matter to the Office of the Inspector General, suggesting an accusation of potential fraud.
Days after Zeldin's directive, federal prosecutor Denise Cheung resigned after declining to freeze an unidentified bank's accounts for a government contractor, saying she had not found "sufficient evidence" of criminal activity. Cheung's resignation is believed to have stemmed from Zeldin's accusations regarding the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund.
In an interview with "Living on Earth" on Public Radio Exchange last month, Jillian Blanchard, vice president of climate change and environmental justice at Lawyers for Good Government, said Zeldin's push to claw back $20 billion that was awarded last year through legislation passed by Congress suggests that "this executive [branch] seems to believe that they have and should have more power than both Congress and the courts."
"They have essentially acted as if they control the power of the purse, but very clearly written into the Constitution is the separation of powers that grants Congress and Congress alone the power of making funding decisions," said Blanchard.
The Trump administration has already been blocked from freezing funds that were were appropriated by Congress. In January the president moved to block federal grants and loans in an order that was swiftly blocked by federal courts, with one judge saying the funding freeze was "likely unconstitutional."
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Wall Street Banks Accused of Trying to Sabotage Key Consumer Protection Rule
"The CFPB must stop this ploy by the biggest banks to keep us trapped under their thumbs."
Nov 15, 2024
Consumer advocates applauded last month as the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau finalized a rule aimed at making it easier for people to switch financial institutions if they're unhappy with a bank's service, without the bank retaining their personal data—but on Thursday, more than a dozen groups warned the CFPB that major Wall Street firms are trying to stop Americans from benefiting from the rule.
Several advocacy groups, led by the Demand Progress Education Fund, wrote to CFPB director Rohit Chopra warning that major banks—including JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America, Citi, TD Bank, and Wells Fargo—sit on the board of the Financial Data Exchange (FDX), which has applied to the bureau for standard-setting body (SSB) status, which would give it authority over what is commonly known as the "open banking rule."
Standard-setting authority for the banks would present a major conflict of interest, said the groups.
The banks are also on the board of the Bank Policy Institute, which promptly filed what the consumer advocates called a "frivolous lawsuit" to block the open banking rule when it was introduced last month, claiming it will keep banks from protecting customer data.
At a panel discussion this week, Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan also said the open banking rule, by requiring financial firms to unlock a consumer's financial data and transfer it to another provider for free, would cause "chaos" and amplify concerns over fraud.
"The American people are fed up with Wall Street controlling every aspect of their lives and the open banking rule is an opportunity to give all of us some financial freedom."
The groups wrote on Thursday that big banks want to continue to "maintain their dominance by making it unduly difficult for consumers to switch institutions."
"The presence of these organizations on both the FDX and BPI boards undermines the credibility of FDX and presents various concerns relating to conflict of interest, interlocking directorate, and antitrust law," they wrote.
Upon introducing the finalized rule last month, Chopra said the action would "give people more power to get better rates and service on bank accounts, credit cards, and more" and help those who are "stuck in financial products with lousy rates and service."
The coalition of consumer advocacy groups—including Public Citizen, the American Economic Liberties Project, and Americans for Financial Reform—urged Chopra to reject FDX's application for standard-setting authority so long as the banks remain on its board.
“It would be a flagrant conflict of interest for the same banks who are suing to block the open banking rule because it threatens their market dominance to also be in charge of implementing it," said Demand Progress Education Fund corporate power director Emily Peterson-Cassin. "The American people are fed up with Wall Street controlling every aspect of their lives and the open banking rule is an opportunity to give all of us some financial freedom. The CFPB must stop this ploy by the biggest banks to keep us trapped under their thumbs."
The groups called the open banking rule "a historic step forward for the cause of giving consumers true freedom intheir financial lives."
"For this reason, it is imperative that SSB status not be granted to an organization whose board members are, either directly or through a trade association they are participating in, suing the CFPB to stop the rules from taking effect, particularly when such members may be ethically conflicted from such dual participation," said the groups. "By rejecting SSB status for FDX or any other organization with similar conflicts of interest pertaining to Section 1033, the CFPB will help prevent big banks from sabotaging open banking rules."
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50 Arrested in Final 'Historic' Summer of Heat Protest at Citibank
"We're here for you and your children," one campaigner told a police officer who was arresting her. "We're here for our world."
Sep 05, 2024
Closing out a "historic" summer of civil disobedience—but with no plans to back off their demands that Wall Street divest from planet-heating fossil fuels—the "Summer of Heat" campaign blockaded the entrance of Citibank's headquarters in New York for an hour on Thursday.
At the 32nd protest held by Stop the Money Pipeline, New York Communities for Change, and other groups since June 10, organizers said 50 people were arrested, including climate scientists and an advocate dressed as an orca—a reference to numerous cases of whales ramming and sinking luxury yachts in recent years.
"The water is too damn hot!" said the costumed protester. "Stop funding fossil fuels."
Summer of Heat has targeted Citibank due to its status as Wall Street's largest funder of methane gas extraction since 2016 and the second-worst funder of oil, coal, and gas projects in recent years, spending $396.3 billion from 2016-23.
For an hour, roughly 1,000 Citibank employees were barred from entering the building as protesters blocked the doors.
"I've been studying climate change since 1982 and no one is listening to the data," said biologist and anti-fracking advocate Sandra Steingraber—who has joined multiple Summer of Heat actions—as she was arrested. "So today they're going to have to listen to my body blocking the doors of the world's largest funder of new fossil fuel projects."
More than 5,000 people have joined Summer of Heat protests since June, and there have been more than 600 arrests. Citibank's response to the demonstrators has escalated to violence at times, with a security guard punching one protester in the building's lobby last month.
One woman told police arresting her on Thursday that her grandson suffers from asthma resulting from wildfire smoke, which climate scientists have linked to fossil fuel extraction and planetary heating.
"We're here for you and your children," she told an officer. "We're here for our world."
As the campaigners blocked the Citibank entrance, cellist John Mark Rozendaal and Stop the Money Pipeline director Alec Connon were preparing to attend a court hearing on Friday regarding assault and criminal contempt charges. Connon has said he was "falsely accused of assault by Citibank security so they could get a restraining order" keeping him from returning to protests at the headquarters.
Mary Lawlor, United Nations special rapporteur on human rights defenders, expressed "strong concern at the charges" and said she would be "closely following" the trial.
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'What Real Eldership Looks Like': 69 Senior Climate Protesters Arrested at CitiBank HQ
Wall Street giant responsible for massive funding of fossil fuels accused of "robbing our grandchildren's future."
Aug 27, 2024
The " Summer of Heat on Wall Street" protests continued Tuesday with at least 69 elders arrested while blocking Citibank's New York City headquarters to demand an end to the bank's financing of climate-wrecking fossil fuel projects.
"I'm here for my children and grandchildren," one woman explained as she was led away by a New York Police Department officer, wrists zip-tied behind her back. "I have kids and they need to live a better future!"
She was among several protesters who wore signs hanging from their necks that said "I'm here for:" followed by photos of loved ones.
BREAKING: NYPD arrests 29 grandparents at @Citibank HQ for demanding an end to Citi’s financing of oil, gas and coal projects.
“I have kids and they need to live a better future!” #SummerofHeat #CitiDropFossilFuels pic.twitter.com/j93mMl1YhS
— New York Communities for Change (@nychange) August 27, 2024
Bill McKibben, a 350.org co-founder arrested at a related action earlier this summer, welcomed Tuesday's protest on social media. Borrowing a phrase from Hip Hop Caucus' Rev. Lennox Yearwood Jr., he
declared, "Can't stop won't stop!"
"Old and bold!!" he added in response to footage of some arrests, also highlighting Third Act, his group for "Americans over the age of 60 determined to change the world for the better," which organized Tuesday's protest.
The Summer of Heat campaign was
initiated by a coalition that includes Climate Defenders, New York Communities for Change, Planet Over Profit, and Stop the Money Pipeline with support from more than 100 environmental and racial justice groups.
"Since the campaign launch on June 10, over 4,000 people have joined protests as part of the Summer of Heat," according to organizers. "And over 500 people have been arrested for engaging in nonviolent civil disobedience protests, urging banks like Citigroup to stop bankrolling new coal, oil, and gas."
Sharing a photo of one protester on social media Tuesday, Stop the Money Pipeline director Alec Connon said that "when I'm older I hope I will be like Pat, who was just arrested for blocking the doors to the headquarters of the world's largest funder of fossil fuel expansion since the Paris agreement. In a time of climate crisis, this is what real eldership looks like."
Tuesday's action in New York—which came as over 60 million people in the U.S. Midwest and Northeast faced heat advisories—followed a July demonstration in which Third Act members led a "funeral procession" near Citigroup's headquarters to honor elders who have died during recent dangerous heatwaves. That protest also led to arrests.
Other Summer of Heat actions targeting Citibank that resulted in arrests have been held by cello-playing grandfather, faith leaders, and mothers who gathered with their children outside bank CEO Jane Fraser's luxury apartment building.
This past weekend, over 30 self-described "climate feminists" were arrested in another demonstration outside Fraser's home, where they chanted: "Methane Jane, you can't hide. We charge you with ecocide."
More than 30 feminists sit down in the street in front of Methane Jane Fraser’s TriBeCa apartment. There’s nothing feminist about funding ecocide. pic.twitter.com/CtuQGWVaqh
— New York Communities for Change (@nychange) August 25, 2024
An annual report released in May showed that in 2023—the hottest year on record—the world's 60 biggest banks committed $705 billion to companies conducting business in fossil fuels, bringing the total since the Paris agreement to $6.9 trillion. Citi's totals were more than $30 billion last year and $396 billion overall.
This post has been updated to clarify when Bill McKibben was arrested and to include additional arrests after publication.
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Citibank Staffer Punches Climate Activist During Protest
"Citi keeps proving their violent business is rooted in violent people," said the Planet Over Profit campaign.
Aug 14, 2024
A climate protester was taken to a hospital bleeding on Wednesday, according to organizers, after a security guard at Citibank's global headquarters in New York punched him in the face as campaigners assembled in the lobby of the building.
The climate advocate, Eren Can Illeri, was taking part in an action organized by Summer of Heat, which is supported by a coalition including New York Communities for Change, Planet Over Profit, and Stop the Money Pipeline.
Illeri was joining other campaigners in calling on Citibank executives to meet with them to discuss the bank's funding of fossil fuel projects. Citibank has invested $396.3 billion into coal, gas, and oil infrastructure projects since the Paris climate agreement was finalized in 2015, and Summer of Heat has made the bank its top target this summer as it demands Wall Street divest from the climate emergency.
"We have been asking Citi to meet with us for weeks to talk about what it can do to tackle the climate emergency," said Alicé Nascimento, a spokesperson for the Summer of Heat campaign. "But rather than meet with us, they have sent their security guards to physically attack peaceful climate activists after weeks of intimidation and threats."
Illeri appeared to be filming with a cellphone when the security staff member approached him and tried to grab the phone out of his hands, according to a video of the incident. The guard then punched Illeri in the face while holding the phone, and pushed him to the ground.
BREAKING: Citibank staff punches peaceful climate activist in the face for taking video. He was taken to the hospital bleeding.@Citi keeps proving their violent business is rooted in violent people. This can't go on. pic.twitter.com/E1KCwQ1dCY
— Planet Over Profit (@pop4climate) August 14, 2024
The violence displayed mirrors "the violence of fossil fuels and climate chaos," said Alice Hu, a climate campaigner for New York Communities for Change.
"Citi backs violence and it's sickening," she said.
Summer of Heat began on June 10, and since then more than 4,000 campaigners have joined protests to demand Citibank end its financing of fossil fuel projects.
More than 475 people have been arrested for protesting the bank's investments—including a cello-playing grandfather last week—and protesters last month reported being shoved by one of the bank's top lawyers.
"Citi keeps proving their violent business is rooted in violent people," said Planet Over Profit. "This can't go on."
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What I Would Have Said as My Friend Defied Citi With Song
Biologist Sandra Steingraber was invited to speak as climate activist John Mark Rozendaal disobeyed a restraining order to play cello outside CitiBank’s headquarters. However, that speech was never delivered.
Aug 10, 2024
On August 8, 63-year-old professional cellist, climate activist, and grandfather, John Mark Rozendaal, was arrested while playing the opening strains of Bach’s “Suites for Cello” outside of CitiBank’s world headquarters in Manhattan. Rozendaal is one of the leaders of the ongoing Summer of Heat civil disobedience campaign that has targeted CitiBank for financing new fossil fuel projects. Earlier this month, Citibank used false allegations to obtain a restraining order to prevent Rozendaal, along with author and campaign leader Alec Connon, from returning to Citibank headquarters or risk being charged with criminal contempt, a crime which carries a maximum seven-year jail sentence. Biologist Sandra Steingraber was invited to bear witness to his restraining order-defying performance and speak at a press event about the significance of his actions. However, that speech was never delivered. Just as Rozendaal began to play the first measures of the suite, police rushed in. Rozendaal and Connon were arrested, as were Steingraber and 13 others in attendance who had formed a circle around the musician as he played. This is the speech that was not delivered.
Good morning. My name is Sandra Steingraber. I’m a PhD biologist, and I like nothing more than to talk about data.
But today, we are here to witness an extraordinary act of courage, and I’m going to speak very personally.
I grew up in coal-country Illinois and was adopted out of a Methodist orphanage. I was a sensitive, introverted child who struggled with human attachment and a sense of belonging. By the time I was 14, I had fallen in love with two things: the Polish composer Frederic Chopin and photosynthesis.
Of all things central to our humanity that climate change threatens, music is on the list.
The idea that I could, with my own fingers, turn black notes on a page—assembled more than a century earlier—into something divinely beautiful was thrilling to me. When I played Chopin, I felt a connection to all the other pianists who had, for generations before me, memorized and practiced this same score for their own recitals.
Meanwhile, the opera of photosynthesis, which takes place inside the miniature Quonset huts called chloroplasts, connected me to the origins of life itself. The idea that green plants can draw in all our exhaled breath through the stomata of their leaves and, in the presence of sunlight, spin carbon dioxide together with water was awesome to me.
With the aid of cytochrome transport systems and leaping electrons, plants undertake an exquisitely beautiful act of biochemical self-creation. They make themselves. They exhale oxygen. And they feed us all.
The biological phenomenon of photosynthesis gave me a sense of ancestry.
By the time I went to college, I had discovered two things: 1) My ear for music was much better than my execution, which was not great; 2) I really loved trees.
So, I forsook the piano for plant ecology and, for my PhD research I learned the skills of dendrochronology, which allowed me to reconstruct the centuries-long history of a forest by studying the patterns of tree rings inside the heartwood of 200-year-old red pines.
The inside of a tree is a living scroll that tells the story—if you are trained to read the language of xylem and phloem—of the entire ecosystem. You can learn, for example, which years great forest fires swept through or which years had especially long winters. I became a historian of forests by studying the rings of the deep inside the trunks of individual trees.
I would have liked nothing better than to spend my life studying trees. But the acceleration of the climate crisis is now torching forests around the world. And drowning them with saltwater. And ravaging them with emergent diseases. And driving their pollinators into extinction. And otherwise stressing them to the point where they can no longer remove and sequester carbon dioxide from the air around them.
So, that’s why I became a civil disobedient with the Summer of Heat campaign. My responsibility as a plant biologist in this moment in human history is to do more than just teach photosynthesis and praise trees. All the oxygen we breathe is provided to us by plants, and they are in trouble. And governments aren’t acting. And banks like Citi keep on financing new fossil fuel projects that are ravaging ecosystems.
For me, the extraordinary concert we are about to witness is the place where botany and music come together.
Orchestral instruments like cellos and violins—as well as the bows drawn across their strings—are made from trees. And not just any trees but tree species that have what musicians call tonewood.
Pernambuco. Ebony. Certain species of maple and spruce.
These trees have cell walls with acoustical properties that vibrate in certain frequencies and, if they are all uniform in size and density, provide the richness of sound that we experience as musical. Different woods have different resonant qualities due to the ratio of cellulose and lignan. Typically, trees used to make classicial musical instruments are 200-400 years old with 20-inch trunks and tree rings that show slow and steady growth.
In a warming climate, however, annual growth rings have become less consistent in size, and the wood has become softer. Instrument-making trees are also increasingly targeted by emerging insect pests.
Trees with tonewood are now growing in more extreme weather conditions and enduring more frequent droughts. Those conditions alter their cellular architecture in ways that alter the tonal qualities of the wooden soundboards of the musical instruments made from their wood. As a result, orchestral music will sound different in the future. Of all things central to our humanity that climate change threatens, music is on the list.
Fifty years ago, playing a Chopin nocturne had the power to stop me from self-injuring. Listening to my friend John Mark Rozendaal defy Citi’s attempt to silence peaceful protest again the financing of climate ruin by performing Bach’s “Suites for Cello” will, I believe, have the power to call us all to stop injury to the planet.
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Outrage as NYPD Arrests Cello-Playing Grandfather at Citibank Climate Protest
"Rather than doing something about its role in the climate crisis, Citi is choosing instead to target climate activists with false charges and unwarranted arrests," said cellist John Mark Rozendaal.
Aug 08, 2024
Climate campaigners expressed incredulous outrage Thursday following the arrest of a 63-year-old Extinction Rebellion activist who violated a dubious restraining order by playing a cello outside Citibank's New York headquarters during a protest against the bank's funding of fossil fuel projects.
John Mark Rozendaal, a professional cellist and grandfather, performed Bach's "Suites for Cello" before he was arrested in the public plaza outside Citibank's headquarters in Lower Manhattan during a "Summer of Heat on Wall Street" protest against banks' fossil fuel financing. New York Police Department (NYPD) officers also arrested 14 peaceful protesters who encircled Rozendaal.
Last month, a Citibank security guard obtained what Extinction Rebellion said was an unconstitutional restraining order against Rozendaal and another activist, Stop the Money Pipeline director Alec Connon. According to the activists, the security guard claimed he was assaulted after hitting his head on a plastic pipe that demonstrators were using to block an entrance to the bank.
Rozendaal and Connon were warned that any violation of the restraining order could result in criminal contempt charges carrying a maximum sentence of seven years in prison.
"Over the last decade, Citibank has been the world's number one funder of fossil fuel expansion," Rozendaal said Thursday. "Yet rather than doing something about its role in the climate crisis, Citi is choosing instead to target climate activists with false charges and unwarranted arrests."
Thousands of people have rallied to demand an end to fossil fuel financing during two months of ongoing Summer of Heat demonstrations. More than 475 activists—including scientists, faith leaders, elders, students, and parents—have been arrested during the protests.
"It's alarming that Citibank is resorting to scare tactics to intimidate climate activists that are simply trying to get the bank to stop financing the fossil fuel industry that is killing our planet and polluting our communities," Democratic New York City Councilwoman Sandy Nurse said in response to Rozendaal's arrest.
"Citi should stop targeting activists and focus instead on ending its support for fossil fuels," Nurse added.
The Center for International Environmental Law, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit advocacy group, said that "the use of vague restraining orders to keep protesters away from Citi's New York headquarters represents a troubling effort to suppress these lawful demonstrations and mute advocacy for a just and sustainable world."
"Such measures not only threaten democratic freedoms and hinder crucial advocacy against environmental racism, but most importantly undermine efforts to challenge the financial underpinnings of the climate crisis," the group added.
New York Communities for Change climate campaigner Alice Hu said on social media that "it's wild Citi would have NYPD arrest the 63-year-old peaceful protester for *checks notes* playing the cello."
"But, ultimately unsurprising from the top funder of new fossil fuels since 2016," Hu added. "After all, the floods, fires, and famines that Citi funds are the epitome of violence."
Rafael Shimunov, who hosts the "Beyond the Pale" program on left-wing New York radio station WBAI, quipped, "Thank you NYPD and Citibank, our streets are so much safer without this 63-year-old cellist on them."
The Summer of Heat on Wall Street is set to continue next week, as immigration rights groups are planning to lead a "Migrants Grieve and Rage Against Climate Destruction" day of action outside Citibank's headquarters on August 13.
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Moms and Kids Protest Fossil Fuel Expansion at Citigroup CEO's Home
Dozens of climate campaigners were arrested for protesting the multinational bank's financing of new fossil fuel development.
Jul 27, 2024
Hundreds of activists, largely mothers and their kids, protested outside Citigroup CEO Jane Fraser's luxury apartment building in New York City on Saturday, calling for the multinational bank she leads to stop funding fossil fuel expansion.
The protest, at which 59 people were arrested, was part of the Summer of Heat, a program of nonviolent direct action led by five climate advocacy groups that has targeted Citigroup because it's a leading funder of the fossil fuel industry.
The activists set up a memorial on the sidewalk outside Fraser's building dedicated to the tens of millions of children who've been displaced because of climate change in recent years.
Marlena Fontes, a director at Climate Defenders who organized the action, explained the impact of climate change on her family in a speech to gathered protesters. She said that when haze from Canadian wildfires covered New York City last year, her son was afraid, and her one-year-old daughter had an asthma attack.
"She was just one of many, many children on this planet who are being affected by the climate crisis," Fontes said.
BREAKING: NYPD arrests grandparents, parents, students, scientists and clergy outside of @Citibank CEO Jane Fraser’s NYC penthouse.
Citi keeps pouring billions into oil, gas and coal projects killing our kids. Jane can’t hide from responsibility. #SummerofHeat pic.twitter.com/0FUBStYvuK
— New York Communities for Change (@nychange) July 27, 2024
The protestors marched from Citigroup's headquarters to the apartment building, located a few blocks away. About 200 or 300 people took part in the protest, and 59 were arrested; the police were on site before they even arrived, Alicé Nascimento, policy director at New York Communities for Change, one of the Summer of Heat organizing groups, told Common Dreams. The other organizing groups are Climate Defenders, Climate Organizing Hub, Stop the Money Pipeline, and the youth-led Planet Over Profit.
BREAKING: Hundreds of parents and climate activists are about to descend onto the luxury apartment complex of Jane Fraser, the high powered CEO of @Citibank, the world’s biggest funder of fossil fuel expansion.
We’re taking the crisis to her doorstep. #SummerofHeat pic.twitter.com/50zGKVBwjT
— New York Communities for Change (@nychange) July 27, 2024
Summer of Heat, which began actions in early June, has turned out to be aptly named, as the summer has been full of deadly heatwaves in the U.S. and across the northern hemisphere. Saturday's action came following a week of extreme global temperatures: Monday was the hottest day in recorded history, breaking a record set just the day before. United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres on Thursday called for coordinated global action to deal with extreme heat, including by transitioning away from fossil fuels.
Corporations like Citigroup make that transition far more difficult, campaigners say. Citigroup was responsible for providing more financing to companies developing new fossil fuel projects than any other bank in the world for the period from 2015 to 2023, according to a Banking on Climate Chaos report published in May. In terms of overall financing to fossil fuel companies, Citigroup ranked second in the world, behind only JPMorgan Chase, at nearly $400 billion during that period.
Saturday's action was the first of the summer targeted at Fraser's home, though a smaller group of campaigners did protest there in February. Fraser has in the past expressed a willingness to take a climate into account in Citigroup's dealings.
Rachel Rivera, a member of New York Communities for Change, spoke to the gathered protesters about the struggles that her family has faced in the past and in the recent extreme heat. She was displaced during Hurricane Sandy in 2012 and lost loved ones in Puerto Rico to Hurricane Maria in 2017. A mother of six, she said that last week her 10-year-old daughter had to be hospitalized and intubated due to respiratory seizures brought on by the extreme heat.
"Jane Fraser should walk a mile in my shoes," she said.
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As Temperature Records Fall, the Summer of Heat on Wall Street Is Warming Up
This Friday, we’re gearing up for the largest Summer of Heat action so far: the Gulf South Rising, Fossil Banks Sinking March and Mass Civil Disobedience.
Jun 26, 2024
It’s not even July yet, but already the world is on fire. Over the last few weeks, more than 1,300 Hajj pilgrims died due to heat sickness. In Greece, the Acropolis shuttered after several tourists succumbed in the heat. The highest June temperature ever reliably recorded on the continent of Africa occurred in Egypt. In Mexico, hundreds of howler monkeys have perished. In the United States, multiple heat records were broken.
As we learn to live in this hotter, harsher world it’s critical to remember that these are not natural disasters. These heatwaves have been inflicted upon us by a relatively small number of people: fossil fuel executives and the politicians and corporations that have done their bidding over the past half a century.
It seems appropriate, then, that, as the world bakes, more than 100 climate groups are running an aptly named new campaign: the Summer of Heat on Wall Street, a campaign of sustained nonviolent civil disobedience against the banks, investors, and insurance companies that are propping up the oil and gas industry.
Citi workers might not like the fact that we’re engaging in nonviolent civil disobedience at their headquarters, but they should like the fact that their company is directly complicit in the heatwaves killing people around the world even less.
Since the campaign launched on June 10, some 184 arrests have been made at the headquarters of the world’s largest funder of fossil fuel expansion: Citibank.
During the campaign’s first week, activists (including myself) blockaded every entrance to Citi’s HQ with 150+ people, signs, and banners. On Tuesday, youth groups led the way, blocking the doors while dressed as orcas. On Wednesday, it was the turn of the scientists, including Dr. Sandra Steingraber and Dr. Peter Kalmus, who led a teach-in at the HQ and delivered a letter to Citi’s CEO from 750+ climate scientists. On Thursday, elders blockaded the headquarters with 50+ rocking chairs.
The following week, youth-led climate groups organized a “Climate Justice Means Free Palestine” rally, which turned into a brief occupation of Citi’s headquarters as young people called out both Citi’s role in the atrocities in Gaza and fossil fuels. On Friday, students and other young people blockaded Citi’s HQ with four 15-foot long pipelines that spelled out: Citibank Stop Funding Death.
I don’t know if it was because of the record-breaking heat, or because it was the seventh protest at the headquarters in 10 business days, but Citi employees were much more irascible on Friday than at previous actions. One middle-aged man violently pushed a young student. Another kicked a climate defender in the shin. When one climate defender pointed out that hundreds of people have died in the recent extreme heat, she was told by a Citi worker to “take a Xanax.”
Citi workers might not like the fact that we’re engaging in nonviolent civil disobedience at their headquarters, but they should like the fact that their company is directly complicit in the heatwaves killing people around the world even less.
And so, no matter how angry Citi workers get, or how often we are arrested, we will not let up. This Friday, we’re gearing up for the largest Summer of Heat action so far: the Gulf South Rising, Fossil Banks Sinking March and Mass Civil Disobedience.
We’ll be joined at the action by 130 organizers from communities in the Gulf South directly impacted by the dozens of new fossil fuel projects that are currently slated for the coastlines of Texas and Louisiana, who have traveled to New York to tell Citibank and other Wall Street companies to stop bankrolling the companies polluting their communities.
On Friday, we’ll meet at Zuccotti Park. The choice of location is intentional. In 2011, a few dozen activists arrived with tents at Zuccotti Park and helped spark Occupy Wall Street, a global movement that quickly spread to more than 1,500 cities around the world. From Zuccotti, we will march on the headquarters of Citibank, where more than 100 people will engage in nonviolent civil disobedience by blocking the doors to Citi’s headquarters once again.
Repeatedly blockading the headquarters of a bank may seem like a drastic action, but as the deadly heat currently scorching the world reminds us: The fight to end the fossil fuel industry could not be more important. And as history reminds us, civil disobedience has been a critical strategy for social movements throughout history―and so I hope to see you there on Friday.
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'Financing the Arsonists': Scientists Arrested During Citigroup Climate Protest
"I invite you to join us, at any level of risk tolerance," said one participant in the New York demonstration. "It feels deeply meaningful—even joyful—to be a part of this movement and to stand on the right side of history."
Jun 12, 2024
Police arrested 28 people, including several scientists, protesting outside Citigroup's headquarters in New York City on Wednesday as climate campaigners continued a series of actions targeting the bank for financing oil and gas projects.
Dozens of scientists and allies, some wearing white lab coats, marched to the bank's entrances holding signs and banners with messages like "The Science Is Clear," as they condemned Citigroup for financing nearly $400 billion in fossil fuel extraction in the eight years after the 2015 Paris agreement was signed.
Several scientists gave speeches before or as they were being arrested.
"I have studied climate change since 1982," Sandra Steingraber, a biologist and retired scholar in residence at Ithaca College, said in a speech outside the Wall Street giant's entrances. "I've testified. I've sent letters to the White House. I've met with the science advisor. I went to the Paris Climate talks. But carbon dioxide levels just reached a new high, and Citi here is financing the arsonists."
Police arrested Steingraber, who, as she was being taken away in handcuffs, declared: "I'm not interested in writing eulogies for the species that I study!"
BREAKING: Scientists arrested for blockading the doors of @citibank, the world’s second largest funder of fossil fuels.
Citi is ignoring the science, so we’re bringing the crisis to their doorstep. #SummerofHeat pic.twitter.com/7sIvfr7kML
— New York Communities for Change (@nychange) June 12, 2024
The scientists' protest was part of a series of climate actions undertaken as part of the Summer of Heat, a program organized by Climate Defenders, Climate Organizing Hub, New York Communities for Change, Planet Over Profit, and Stop The Money Pipeline (STMP).
A total of 28 people were arrested Wednesday, including several scientists, Alec Connon, STMP co-director, told Common Dreams. Dozens of campaigners were also arrested at Citigroup's headquarters on both Monday, in a highly-attended kickoff to the summer activism series, and Tuesday, in an orca-themed follow-up.
During Wednesday's protest, the scientists delivered a joint letter, published Monday by the Union of Concerned Scientists and addressed to Citigroup's leadership, urging the bank to stop financing fossil fuel projects scientists delivered a letter addressed to Citigroup's leadership urging the bank to stop financing fossil fuel projects.
Activist pressure on major banks has risen in recent years following revelations—notably in the annual Banking on Climate Chaos report, published by nonprofit groups—about the key role they've played in funding oil, gas, and coal projects. The most recent report found that the world's 60 largest banks had provided $6.9 trillion in funding to the fossil fuel industry in the eight years after the Paris Agreement.
The pressure has had an effect on some banks: HSBC and, more recently, Barclays have declared that they would stop financing new oil and gas projects. However, the Bureau of Investigative Journalism has reported that HSBC remains involved in fossil fuel deals.
Bank loans to fossil fuel companies are used not just to continue extraction at existing sites but also to explore and develop new reserves, even though the International Energy Agency has said there can be no more such development if climate goals are to be met. Citigroup has funded more new extraction than any bank in the world, the Banking on Climate Chaos report found.
Yet in response to Monday's action, Citigroup claimed it was part of the transition to a green economy.
"Citi respects the advocacy of climate activists, and we are supporting the transition to a low-carbon economy through our net zero commitments and our $1 trillion sustainable finance goal," a bank spokesperson said a statement, according to media outlets. "Our approach reflects the need to transition while also continuing to meet global energy needs."
The statement did not win over climate activists. "This is the sort of bald-faced corporate lie that could cost us our planet," Peter Kalmus, a NASA climate scientist, wrote in a Newsweek op-ed published Wednesday.
Kalmus attended Wednesday's protest. Standing outside Citigroup's headquarters, he said, "We've written thousands and thousands of papers and they have not listened to us. They're fools. They’re stupid. They're being unwise. They have to start listening to scientists."
Summer of Heat organizers have events planned throughout the summer. In the op-ed, Kalmus reached out to readers to join the effort.
"I invite you to join us, at any level of risk tolerance," he wrote. "In my experience, and in the experience of many other climate activists I know, civil disobedience has been a very effective way to create social change. And a big change is happening: A transition from a profit-above-life, colonial-extractivist, genocidal mindset, to a loving, sharing, interconnected mindset. It feels deeply meaningful—even joyful—to be a part of this movement and to stand on the right side of history."
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