When a fossil fuel company knowingly drives climate disasters by spewing greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere and covering up the dangers, and people die — that’s a crime.
Victims who are injured or killed by the fossil fuel industry’s climate disasters deserve justice no less than the victims of street-level homicides or other deadly crimes.
Add your name to the letter and show Attorney General Garland that there’s overwhelming support for investigating the crimes of the fossil fuel industry:
Dear Attorney General Garland,
We are writing to you as a cross-section of Americans who have survived a range of climate-driven disasters caused by the fossil fuel industry’s disregard for our lives, our health, and our planet. We have survived hurricanes, floods, extreme heat, fires, and other hazards impacting our lives more frequently and with greater intensity due to climate change. Others of us join this letter as allies: we’ve watched friends, family members, and neighbors pick up the pieces after climate disasters and suspect that we too will suffer similar events before long. Together, we are calling on the Department of Justice to investigate the fossil fuel industry for climate-related crimes.
The fossil fuel industry has known since the 1950s about the dangers posed by burning fossil fuels. Instead of acting responsibly on their own scientists’ warnings, they waged a decades-long disinformation campaign to muddy the science and confuse and mislead the public. The burning of fossil fuels has racked up enormous profits for fossil fuel companies while stoking the fire of climate change and driving increasingly lethal extreme weather events that have destroyed lives, property, and livelihoods. And the damage is far from over. Communities across the country are battling a summer onslaught of deadly heat waves, hurricanes, and wildfires.
While our stories and experiences are diverse, the fossil fuel industry’s misconduct is a consistent throughline. Some of us have lost our homes and property, our businesses, and our entire communities to climate-driven disasters. Some of us have suffered from repeat climate disasters, making recovery even more difficult, or even out of reach. And some of us have suffered the unspeakable loss of our neighbors, friends, and family members—all at the hands of an industry that has the power to change course but instead chooses to persist in an extremely dangerous course of conduct causing catastrophic harm, just as predicted.
We call on the Department of Justice to investigate the crimes of the fossil fuel industry. Victims and survivors of the industry-caused climate crisis deserve justice.
