RINSE AND REPEAT: WHITEHOUSE CALLS FOR DOJ INVESTIGATION FOR THE…FIFTH TIME? By MANDI RISKO

But this isn’t the first, second, third or even fourth time Senator Whitehouse has sent a letter or asked DOJ directly about launching a politically-charged investigation into leading energy companies

RINSE AND REPEAT: WHITEHOUSE CALLS FOR DOJ INVESTIGATION FOR THE…FIFTH TIME?

MAY 22, 2024 | MANDI RISKO

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Today, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) and Representative Jamie Raskin (D-MD) announced they are yet again asking the Department of Justice (DOJ) to launch a worn out, politically-motivated investigation into the fossil fuel industry. The move comes after the Senate Budget Committee failed to produce a shred of new evidence at a hearing earlier this month intended to build off the House Oversight Committee’s (HCOR) failed investigation into energy companies.

But this isn’t the first, second, third, or even fourth time that Senator Whitehouse has sent a letter or asked the DOJ directly about launching a politically-charged investigation into leading energy companies. In fact, the Rhode Island Senator has been requesting the Department file a “tobacco-like” lawsuit since 2015 with various co-signers – making the most recent letter, with only two signers, just a drop in the bucket.

Despite the years-long effort, the DOJ has resisted such calls to weigh in on climate litigation or launch its own investigation – until last year, that is, when the U.S. Supreme Court forced the Solicitor General to share its opinion on the jurisdictional question. Although the DOJ’s brief was in favor of the cases progressing in state court, it was hardly a broad endorsement of the litigation writ large.

Calling for an investigation one (or ten) more times won’t change the facts

Whitehouse’s fishing expedition began nearly ten years ago after Inside Climate News published their now-debunked #ExxonKnew series. But like a broken record, Whitehouse can’t get his attention off his favorite political foe: companies that produce the oil and natural gas we need to power our lives.

At the crux of Whitehouse’s argument is a faulty comparison between the tobacco industry and the fossil fuel industry. In fact, at today’s press briefing, Whitehouse made the exact same claim about the alleged overlap between tobacco lawsuits and a potential lawsuit against energy companies that he has throughout the past decade, insisting that the complaints could be nearly identical:

“As I indicated by quoting so often from Judge Gladys Kessler’s decision, the most obvious model for this is the tobacco case, and that was brought as a civil, RICO case.”

Flashback to 2015, Whitehouse told Inside Climate News that there are “whole sections” of the tobacco court decisions where “you can remove the word ‘tobacco’ and put in the word ‘carbon,’ and remove the word ‘health’ and put in the word ‘climate.’”

But beyond Whitehouse’s inability to produce an ounce of proof that points to any wrongdoing on behalf of energy companies, his comparison falls flat because tobacco and hydrocarbons are vastly different products.

In fact, a diverse group of experts have consistently pointed this out, including Atlantic Council Fellow Ariel Cohen, who testified in front of the Senate Budget Committee earlier this month and directly pointed this fact out to Whitehouse:

“The fundamental difference between tobacco and the fossil fuel industry is the fossil fuel industry brings a tangible economic good to the economy. Without it, we cannot have our transportation, or deliveries, our military…so I hope nobody in their right mind is advocating immediate cessation of fossil fuels.” (emphasis added)

Even James Hansen, a former Exxon employee and NASA scientist that supports a fossil fuel phase out has acknowledged that tobacco and hydrocarbons are entirely different products with drastically different values to society:

“Let’s be clear: the frequent comparison of the fossil fuel and tobacco industries is nonsense. Fossil fuels are a valuable energy source that has done yeomen service for humankind… Fossil fuels raised living standards in much of the world.” (emphasis added)

Bottom line: Fundamentally, nothing has changed since Whitehouse first called for an investigation, and anti-industry activists’ bogus attacks against American energy companies continue to fail at every turn. But while politicians and left-wing billionaires keep looking for a “gotcha” moment, American producers are hard at work maximizing