Climate Desk Newsletter
STORIES FROM MOTHER JONES AND ITS PARTNERS
As a veteran science reporter, I have long tracked how research can be distorted for profit. The tobacco industry may be the most famous practitioner, but efforts to besmirch independent evidence of a product’s potential harm as “junk science” have been financed by the chemical, fossil fuel, pharmaceutical, and sugar industries, among others.
Now Republican power players are taking things even further by censoring science they dislike. Notably, last month, the Federal Judicial Center—an educational agency Congress created in 1967 to serve the judicial branch—deleted a chapter on climate science from an influential reference manual federal judges have long used to parse complex science issues in the courtroom.
The deletion was orchestrated by 27 Republican attorneys general who called for the chapter’s immediate withdrawal in order to retain the “judiciary’s impartiality” in climate and energy cases.
Our latest newsletter explores a type of censorship that may have gone under the radar. The federal government has erased climate change from the scientific manual judges reference.
From @lizagross.bsky.social at @insideclimatenews.org
10.03.2026 17:40
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Thanks, @motherjones.com, for running our story about how highly trained ex #EPA staff are calling out the Trump admin's partisan war on the science-based regs that aim to protect our health and environment. Trump's EPA political appointees/ response? Call the scientists "Democratic operatives."
08.03.2026 01:08
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GOP political appointees reduced the number of shots in the universally recommended childhood vaccine schedule, as I recently reported, even as #climatechange helps spread vaccine-preventable diseases. That's why a coalition of AGs, led by Dems in CA and AZ, sued to reinstate science-based recs.
05.03.2026 18:28
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A similar thing happened with the Reference Manual on Scientific Evidence's #climatescience chapter, which was *erased* after 27 GOP AGs claimed this extensively vetted, peer-reviewed independent science resource was biased against US energy production. insideclimatenews.org/news/0303202...
04.03.2026 16:12
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Whoa! That's some parenting ;).
03.03.2026 23:36
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Meet three scientists who said no to Epstein
The warning signs included a web search, a mother’s doubts, and inklings of a “sexist attitude”
Many of the scientists Jeffrey Epstein courted were already well-established and well-funded. So why didn’t they all just say no? Science talked with three who did just that.
Here’s how Epstein approached them, and why they refused to have anything to do with him. ⬇️ https://scim.ag/40qbXnv
03.03.2026 14:30
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Lots happening in the world, but I hope folks can take a minute to catch up on the shocking number of rollbacks EPA is moving forward and their impact on increased exposure to toxic pollutant and health risks.
02.03.2026 15:35
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Brilliant thread from @aetiology.bsky.social
The wellness grifters/anti-vaxxers like Casey Means & RFK Jr always ALWAYS accuse physicians, scientists, & regulators of being corrupted by industry when in fact THEY’RE the ones who are totally & utterly corrupted by hawking woo woo bullshit products
26.02.2026 03:30
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It was a pleasure to talk with @charlespiller.bsky.social about his important and impactful investigations of fraud and misconduct in Alzheimer’s research. Watch the video to get some great tips!
12.02.2026 16:53
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Gladys Mae West obituary: mathematician who pioneered GPS technology
She made key contributions to US cold-war science despite facing huge barriers as a Black woman.
No joke: I got angry hate mail today for writing an obituary of a Black woman scientist—because the person felt she did didn’t deserve the recognition.
Which just makes me want to share it again: www.nature.com/articles/d41...
06.02.2026 09:09
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Just sent it to you.
05.02.2026 19:58
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Mapping Unequal Climate Risks in a Northern California County - Inside Climate News
Low-cost air pollution sensors reveal stark disparities in exposure to extreme heat and air pollution in Contra Costa County, a major traffic corridor and oil refinery hub near San Francisco.
Colliding climate change risks from dirty air and extreme heat compound the disparate burdens many residents of a N. Calif. county already face. A new report from #PSEHealthyEnergy breaks ground by asking community members how to reduce those harms. Read more at @insideclimatenews.org
05.02.2026 15:26
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Really sad. Haven’t seen a single butterfly in the #monarch sanctuary in Pacific Grove. The Western population is in serious trouble.
24.01.2026 17:10
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Native perspective: restoration of desecrated spaces is not the same as land stewardship.
23.01.2026 21:07
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It’s taken a long time for agricultural conferences, even those like EcoFarm that advocate sustainable practices, to include Indigenous voices. Glad to see a packed house for the one on tribal food sovereignty held in a large auditorium.
23.01.2026 21:07
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Thank you for sharing!
23.01.2026 14:58
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California has a land equity problem. 63.5% of landowners
operate on 50 acres or less, yet this majority owns
just 9.9% of total cropland acreage in the state, according to the 2017 USDA Census of Agriculture, .
Just 4.6% of landowners collectively own almost half of the state’s total cropland.
22.01.2026 23:53
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Thanks, Meg!
20.01.2026 21:28
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Oh my!
19.01.2026 23:47
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