For decades, judicial education has served a narrow but vital purpose: helping judges understand complex technical issues without telling them how to rule. That boundary matters. Once judicial education becomes advocacy, courts stop acting as neutral arbiters and begin functioning as instruments of policy enforcement.
The Federal Judicial Center crossed that line.
In endorsing the Fourth Edition of the “Reference Manual on Scientific Evidence,” produced by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, the taxpayer-funded center embedded contested, plaintiff-driven climate litigation theories into one of the most authoritative reference works relied upon by judges nationwide.
The result was not neutral guidance on the scientific method. It was an evidentiary framework that tracked the legal strategy of climate plaintiffs.
The reference manual is not a blog post. Judges rely on it when evaluating expert testimony, determining admissibility, and weighing causation in complex cases.
Historically, it focused on methodology, how science works, what courts should ask, and where uncertainty lies. The Fourth Edition marked a sharp departure.
For the first time, the manual included a “Reference Guide on Climate Science.” That guide, now described by the Federal Judicial Center as “omitted,” treated disputed theories central to active climate litigation as effectively settled. It instructed judges that researchers can quantify the contribution of human emissions to specific damages and suggested that skepticism of those claims may reflect misunderstanding or strategic manipulation.
That framing mirrors the core allegations advanced in climate nuisance and fraud suits moving through state and federal courts.
After pressure from state attorneys general and mounting public scrutiny, the Federal Judicial Center announced that the climate science chapter had been “omitted.” That announcement has been presented as a corrective step. It is not.
The chapter has not been rescinded. The full manual, including the climate guide, remains hosted on the National Academies’ website, still bearing the Federal Judicial Center’s logo and institutional authority, without any disclaimer or notice of withdrawal. Judges, litigants, and researchers can still access and rely on the very material the Federal Judicial Center now claims to have sidelined.
More importantly, removing a chapter does not remove the architecture of influence.
Even without the climate guide, the revised manual continues to elevate a narrow set of activist-aligned authorities in sections purporting to explain “how science works.”
Judges are directed to the writings of Michael Mann and Naomi Oreskes as examples of scientific consensus, without disclosure of their advocacy roles or involvement in litigation narratives.
The manual warns that disagreement over “settled science” may reflect strategic manipulation by stakeholders, explicitly citing climate change alongside tobacco. That is not neutral instruction. It primes judges to view skepticism as suspect.
The problem extends beyond climate.
The manual repeatedly imports ideological frameworks under the banner of scientific context. Judges are instructed that scientific knowledge is shaped by identity, positionality, and intersectionality. Citations emphasize race, gender, and sociological perspective as factors in evaluating expertise.
The omitted climate guide itself relied heavily on figures whose work was developed explicitly with litigation in mind. It praised Richard Heede’s “Carbon Majors” theory, central to climate complaints, without disclosing coordination with plaintiffs’ counsel. It promoted attribution methodologies developed by Myles Allen and Friederike Otto, whose event attribution work was expressly designed with courtroom application in view and is now marketed as a basis for liability. It cited Mann without noting his sanction for bad faith trial misconduct, and Oreskes despite her exclusion as an expert for unreliable methodology.
Those conflicts were never disclosed. Judges were not told that the frameworks presented as neutral analysis were authored by individuals with direct financial and strategic interests in how climate cases are resolved.
This did not happen in isolation.
For years, the Environmental Law Institute’s Climate Judiciary Project hosted seminars aimed at judges in jurisdictions where climate litigation was pending or anticipated. Those programs featured plaintiff-aligned experts and advanced litigation-oriented narratives. The Federal Judicial Center’s endorsement of the Fourth Edition institutionalized those themes within official judicial infrastructure.
The intent was not subtle. At a National Academies workshop convened during development of the manual, participants discussed how to reach judges who might be skeptical and emphasized the need for the manual to “have an impact.” That is not the language of neutral education.
The consequences are serious. When contested theories are embedded in trusted judicial reference materials, judges may treat disputed factual predicates as resolved before adversarial testing occurs. One side enters the courtroom with its framework already normalized. Public confidence in judicial neutrality erodes.
Congress has taken notice. Following investigative work by the American Energy Institute, the House Judiciary Committee opened a formal inquiry into improper judicial influence tied to climate litigation. Yet appropriations to the Federal Judicial Center continue to flow without conditions, even as evidence mounts that taxpayer resources were used to advance one side of active disputes.
Restoring integrity does not require hostility toward science or courts. It requires restoring boundaries. Judicial education must return to explaining methods, uncertainties, and limits, not endorsing contested conclusions. Conflicts of interest must be disclosed. Advocacy must remain outside institutions charged with impartial adjudication.
The question now is whether Congress will insist on genuine neutrality or continue funding a system that engineers outcomes before cases are ever heard.
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