Youth Fight Back as Biden DOJ Seeks to Derail Historic Climate Case

[Brenda]

As the Biden administration seeks to derail a historic youth-led climate lawsuit against the U.S. government, plaintiffs in the suit—some of them now in their mid-to-late 20s—on Thursday moved to block the Department of Justice from further delaying the case.

Plaintiffs in Juliana v. United States filed a challenge to the Biden administration's bid for a stay in the case, calling the Justice Department's latest petition for a writ of mandamus "nothing short of shocking."

Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz—a longtime backer of the plaintiffs—filed a declaration supporting their motion. Lambasting the DOJ's claim that the agency is "irreparably harmed" by having to dedicate human and financial resources to the trial, Stiglitz wrote that "to suggest the harm to children's health and homes and constitutional rights is worth less than the money the government has to spend to litigate a case is to suggest every case could be stayed only because it cost taxpayer dollars to litigate."

Originally filed in 2015 when the plaintiffs were between 8 and 19 years old, Juliana v. United States accuses the federal government of violating young people's constitutional rights to life, liberty, and property, and argues that its actions contributing to the planetary emergency constitute a failure to protect essential public trust resources.

The Obama, Trump, and Biden administrations have all worked to kill the case, delaying trial by years. In 2018, the U.S. Supreme Court stopped the case from going to trial days before it was set to begin. On December 29, U.S. District Court Judge Ann Aiken ruled that the plaintiffs could proceed to trial, which was set to begin January 19. However, on January 18 the DOJ said it would file for a writ of mandamus.

https://www.commondreams.org/news/youth-fight-back-as-biden-doj-seeks-to-derail-historic-climate-case