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Epstein Files Meltdown & Climate Change · Bloomberg Law

0:02
Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Law with June Grossel from Bloomberg Radio.
0:08
Speaker 1: Attorney General Pam Bondi used to say that the Jeffrey
0:12
Speaker 1: Epstein files would be released.
0:15
Speaker 2: You know, tens of thousands of pages of documents and
0:18
Speaker 2: hundreds and hundreds of victims of Jeffrey Epstein. So the
0:24
Speaker 2: FBI they have been working round the clock at my directive,
0:28
Speaker 2: at Kashptel's directive. Now Dan Bongino's there.
0:30
Speaker 3: Who is a great asset for all of us at
0:34
Speaker 3: the FBI as well. But yeah, we have to protect
0:37
Speaker 3: their identity, their personal information to make sure they're safe.
0:41
Speaker 3: But other than that, we are releasing all of these
0:44
Speaker 3: documents as soon as we can get them redacted.
0:47
Speaker 1: That was Bondi on Fox in March. Now the question
0:51
Speaker 1: is whether even a congressional subpoena will make the Attorney
0:55
Speaker 1: General release the files, particularly in light of a Wall
0:58
Speaker 1: Street Journal report that Bondi toll President Trump. His name
1:03
Speaker 1: appears multiple times in the finals. As pressure on the
1:07
Speaker 1: administration to release the Epstein files grows, the Justice Department
1:12
Speaker 1: is taking a detour, apparently casting itself as searching for
1:16
Speaker 1: more information on the Epstein case, with Deputy Attorney General
1:21
Speaker 1: Todd Blanche meeting today with Glaine Maxwell, Jeffrey Epstein's former
1:27
Speaker 1: girlfriend who's serving a twenty year sentence in Florida. Joining
1:31
Speaker 1: me is Dave Ehrenberg, former Palm Beach County State Attorney.
1:35
Speaker 1: Dave the number two person at the Justice Department, Todd Blanche,
1:40
Speaker 1: Trump's former criminal defense attorney, is meeting with a convicted
1:45
Speaker 1: sex trafficker, Gallaine Maxwell, that the Justice Department successfully prosecuted,
1:51
Speaker 1: and it comes as she's appealing her twenty twenty one conviction.
1:55
Speaker 1: How odd is this?
1:58
Speaker 4: It's extremely odd because generally the number two person at
2:03
Speaker 4: the deparminative Justice doesn't conduct interviews with potential witnesses, especially
2:10
Speaker 4: those who have already been convicted by their department of
2:15
Speaker 4: such a serious crime. I mean, why would you ever
2:17
Speaker 4: believe anything this woman says. He's not only a convicted
2:20
Speaker 4: human trafficker, but she's also a liar. She was indicted
2:24
Speaker 4: for perjury back in twenty twenty and she is someone
2:28
Speaker 4: who is untrustworthy. But both sides want something here. She
2:33
Speaker 4: meaning Glen Maxwell, wants a pardon from the President who's
2:37
Speaker 4: very transactional, and President Trump wants her to exonerate him
2:42
Speaker 4: to say that Trump had nothing to do with any
2:44
Speaker 4: of the crimes. Now, I personally believe that Trump had
2:48
Speaker 4: nothing to do with any of the crimes. But there's
2:50
Speaker 4: a lot of smoke here because of Trump's name being
2:54
Speaker 4: in the Epstein files. And you know what they say,
2:56
Speaker 4: it's not the crime but the cover up. And the
2:59
Speaker 4: cover up here is to prevent the release of these
3:02
Speaker 4: files when you promised it over and over again to
3:04
Speaker 4: your supporters. So, yes, this whole thing is extraordinary. Not
3:07
Speaker 4: the lease of which is that the number two person
3:10
Speaker 4: of the Department of Justice doesn't get on a plane
3:13
Speaker 4: and get a briefcase in a notepad and start acting
3:16
Speaker 4: like a line prosecutor.
3:18
Speaker 1: Bland said he wants to know if Glaine Maxwell has
3:21
Speaker 1: information about anyone who has committed crimes against victims. But
3:25
Speaker 1: the Attorney General, Pam Bondi, has said that nothing in
3:28
Speaker 1: the files warranted further investigation or prosecution. So what's going on?
3:35
Speaker 4: This is about CYA. It's to protect Donald Trump. This
3:39
Speaker 4: is to protect him because his name is in the files. Now,
3:43
Speaker 4: his supporters were led to believe that anyone whose names
3:46
Speaker 4: in the files must have committed some crimes. They were
3:48
Speaker 4: led to believe that the number one name in the
3:50
Speaker 4: file would be Bill Clinton, filed by Bill Gates and
3:52
Speaker 4: then every other prominent Democrat. Of course, they were lied to,
3:56
Speaker 4: they were made to look like fools. I mean, these
3:58
Speaker 4: folks thrive on conspiracy theories and now they're outraged and
4:03
Speaker 4: they're ready to revolt. So the administration is trying to
4:06
Speaker 4: placate them further by saying, see, we'll get more information
4:09
Speaker 4: from this disgraced, convicted human trafficker. Well, what makes you
4:14
Speaker 4: think she'll be telling the truth? She has every incentive
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Speaker 4: to lie. She's lie before, she will lie again. Anything
4:20
Speaker 4: that she says should be corroborated. And then if she
4:23
Speaker 4: says something to Todd blanche who was President of Trump's
4:26
Speaker 4: former defense lawyer, his personal defense lawyer, what makes you
4:29
Speaker 4: think will make its way to the public if it
4:31
Speaker 4: at all implicates Donald Trump. So this is not how
4:36
Speaker 4: an investigation should be done. And if the administration wanted
4:40
Speaker 4: full transparency, they should just release the file subject to
4:43
Speaker 4: court orders and other privacy concerns involving the victims, and
4:48
Speaker 4: then I think people would start to move on from
4:51
Speaker 4: this story. But until that happens, this story ain't going away.
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Speaker 1: Did you think that she's talking to Blanche. If she
4:58
Speaker 1: is talking to Blanche, do you think that she's talking
5:00
Speaker 1: to him under some kind of agreement like queen for
5:03
Speaker 1: a day where nothing you say is going to be
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Speaker 1: used against you.
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Speaker 4: Her lawyers would never allow her to talk to a prosecutor,
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Speaker 4: even if it's the number two person at the Department
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Speaker 4: of Justice and not aligned prosecutor. They would never let
5:16
Speaker 4: her talk to anyone without a guarantee that she has
5:19
Speaker 4: immunity for at least those comments on that day. So
5:22
Speaker 4: some call it a Queen for the day. But she's
5:26
Speaker 4: not going to jeopardize her appeal and her potential because
5:32
Speaker 4: she has an appeal pending if she is retried. She
5:34
Speaker 4: doesn't want this information to come back and haunt her.
5:37
Speaker 4: So she wants something out of Donald Trump. She wants
5:40
Speaker 4: a pardon, and she's probably going to be willing to
5:43
Speaker 4: say anything to get it, but she doesn't want it
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Speaker 4: to come back at her in a future trial. So yes,
5:49
Speaker 4: she will get some sort of immunity before she speaks
5:51
Speaker 4: to Todd Blash. Now she goes before Congress, that too
5:54
Speaker 4: will require immunity because her lawyers, I would think, would
5:56
Speaker 4: have the same issue They don't want her to implicate
5:59
Speaker 4: herself any more than she already has.
6:01
Speaker 1: Her brother told The New York Post that she's compiling
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Speaker 1: new evidence pretending to allege government misconduct stemming from her trial,
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Speaker 1: to hand over to the Justice Department.
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Speaker 4: Every criminal defendant believes that there's government misconduct for their case,
6:18
Speaker 4: especially if you're convicted. So yeah, she's going to compile
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Speaker 4: her evidence. Meanwhile, she had any real evidence that could
6:25
Speaker 4: be of use to the government to release the victims
6:28
Speaker 4: and to the public, she would have done so already
6:30
Speaker 4: because now she's facing twenty years in prison. She's not
6:32
Speaker 4: getting out until she's seventy five years old at the earliest.
6:36
Speaker 4: And so if she didn't have the goods back then,
6:40
Speaker 4: why would we believe she has the goods now. I
6:42
Speaker 4: think there's a desperate woman who was willing to say anything.
6:45
Speaker 4: She'll do anything for a pardon. She does not want
6:48
Speaker 4: to spend her next decade or so behind bars. She's
6:53
Speaker 4: not used to this lifestyle. She's used to the high life,
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Speaker 4: life of privilege, life of prestige, and now she's the
7:00
Speaker 4: only one being locked up for the whole Jeffrey Epstein
7:03
Speaker 4: saga because Jeffrey Epstein killed himself.
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Speaker 1: Dave about the congressional subpoena. The House Overside Chair Republican
7:12
Speaker 1: James Comer has subpoenaed Maxwell for a deposition. In what
7:16
Speaker 1: circumstances would her lawyer allow her to testify? How would
7:20
Speaker 1: that kind of testimony help her at all?
7:24
Speaker 4: It will help her if she publicly exonerates President Trump.
7:29
Speaker 4: It will help her get a pardon. That's what she's
7:31
Speaker 4: aiming for. She wants either a pardon a commutation. She
7:35
Speaker 4: wants the Department of Justice to not retry the case
7:38
Speaker 4: if she wins on her appeal, which is going before
7:40
Speaker 4: the Supreme Court. So there are things that Trump can
7:43
Speaker 4: offer her, and that's why she'll be doing this. Otherwise,
7:46
Speaker 4: there's no reason for her to be doing this. I mean,
7:48
Speaker 4: she's a convicted human trafficker, she's a proven liar. She's
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Speaker 4: a criminal. And for the Magabase, which thinks that Jeffrey
7:57
Speaker 4: Epstein is Satan himself, to me how they're willing to
8:01
Speaker 4: roll out the red carpet for Satan's accomplice.
8:05
Speaker 1: The House Oversight sub Committee voted Wednesday to subpoena the
8:09
Speaker 1: DOJ for the Epstein files. And they're not only looking
8:14
Speaker 1: for the files, but also communications between former Biden officials
8:19
Speaker 1: and the Justice Department related to the Epstein matter. Well,
8:24
Speaker 1: the Justice Department hand them over, especially now that the
8:27
Speaker 1: Wall Street Journal has reported that Bondie and Blanche informed
8:32
Speaker 1: the President in May that his name appears multiple times
8:36
Speaker 1: in the Epstein files.
8:38
Speaker 4: Oh, the Department of Justice is not giving Congress anything
8:42
Speaker 4: with Donald Trump's name in it. So if they give
8:45
Speaker 4: up the Epstein file, maybe will be a redacted version
8:48
Speaker 4: of it. But they're not going to do anything to
8:50
Speaker 4: harm the Boss. I mean, that's why the folks are
8:53
Speaker 4: there to begin with. That's why Donald Trump put his
8:55
Speaker 4: two defense lawyers at top positions at the Department of Justice.
8:59
Speaker 4: That's why I picked the loyalists like Pam Bondi to
9:01
Speaker 4: be Attorney General. He doesn't want this thing to get
9:05
Speaker 4: out of hand and get a mind of its own.
9:07
Speaker 4: That's why he's not going to appoint a special counsel.
9:10
Speaker 4: People said, we should have a special counsel. Yeah, well,
9:12
Speaker 4: I remember Bill Clinton had a special counsel. You remember
9:15
Speaker 4: Janerino stepped aside and had Kenneth Starr investigate Whitewater. Well,
9:19
Speaker 4: the investigation in Whitewater became an investigation into Monica Lewinsky
9:23
Speaker 4: and led to Bill Clinton's impeachment. Donald Trump doesn't want
9:26
Speaker 4: to go down that road. He wants to button this
9:28
Speaker 4: thing up. But the irony is in his attempt to
9:31
Speaker 4: cut this off at its knees, he has prolonged the agony.
9:36
Speaker 4: It's not the crime, it's the cover up. And it
9:38
Speaker 4: looks like there's been a cover up here, at least
9:39
Speaker 4: the many in the public, which is why people are
9:42
Speaker 4: still talking about this.
9:43
Speaker 1: Does Congress have any levers to pull to force the
9:47
Speaker 1: Justice Department on this?
9:49
Speaker 4: They can subpoena the documents and then go to court,
9:52
Speaker 4: but you really think the Republicans in Congress are going
9:55
Speaker 4: to go to court to fight the Republicans and the
9:57
Speaker 4: executive branch. One thing we've learned from this is that
10:01
Speaker 4: when the going gets tough, they roll over, They turn
10:04
Speaker 4: tail and run away. This Congress has a masculated itself
10:08
Speaker 4: to the executive branch. And I know they're starting to
10:11
Speaker 4: sense penisn't ask questions about this because their base demands it.
10:14
Speaker 4: Both They'll only go so far. Donald Trump is the
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Speaker 4: leader of their party, and when Donald Trump wants something
10:20
Speaker 4: badly enough, he gets it.
10:22
Speaker 1: Coming up next, why a Florida judge decided not to
10:25
Speaker 1: release the transcripts. This is Bloomberg. I've been talking to
10:28
Speaker 1: Dave Ehrenberg, former Palm Beach County state attorney, about the
10:32
Speaker 1: pressure on the Trump administration to release the Jeffrey Epstein files.
10:37
Speaker 1: Let's talk about the grand jury transcripts first. You can
10:40
Speaker 1: explain why the transcripts will not reveal client lists or
10:45
Speaker 1: any of the other things that the conspiracy theorists are
10:49
Speaker 1: looking for.
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Speaker 4: The grand jury transcripts are just a portion of the
10:54
Speaker 4: portion of what people are looking for. See what they
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Speaker 4: wanted the Epstein files. They want the names of these
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Speaker 4: third parts parties who allegedly were involved with human trafficking.
11:03
Speaker 4: Who were these girls trafficked too, That's what people are seeking.
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Speaker 4: That's not going to be in the grand jury transcripts,
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Speaker 4: especially redacted once. It's not going to be in there.
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Speaker 4: So it's pretty much a distraction that the administration is
11:16
Speaker 4: just seeking these grand jury transcripts and we come on.
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Speaker 4: First of all, they're not going to get him. The
11:21
Speaker 4: judges will reject it, and then they can blame the judiciary,
11:23
Speaker 4: which is part of the strategy because if there's one
11:26
Speaker 4: group that the MAGA world hates more than the media,
11:28
Speaker 4: it's the judiciary. It's judges. So that was actually a
11:32
Speaker 4: smart move I thought by Trump to put the focus
11:34
Speaker 4: on the judges. But it's still not going to work.
11:35
Speaker 4: It's not going to satisfy the MAGA base who've been
11:38
Speaker 4: led to believe there's this client list and that you
11:41
Speaker 4: have this democratic conspiracy to have a child sex trafficking green. Well,
11:46
Speaker 4: it's a different role when you go from being a
11:48
Speaker 4: blogger to being in government. When you're in government, you
11:50
Speaker 4: got to produce. When you're a blogger, you can say
11:52
Speaker 4: whatever you want and never be held accountable for it.
11:55
Speaker 4: And that's a lesson that Caspitel and Dan Begino and
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Speaker 4: others are learning.
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Speaker 1: The Florida said judge has already declined to release the
12:02
Speaker 1: transcripts on what grounds.
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Speaker 4: There are grand jury secrecy rules and you can't get
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Speaker 4: the grand jury transcripts unless you have an exception under
12:13
Speaker 4: the federal law, and there's no exception here just because
12:15
Speaker 4: the public wants to see it. Also, you need to
12:18
Speaker 4: go to victims and get their permission and approvals, but
12:21
Speaker 4: the administration didn't do that. They just went right to
12:23
Speaker 4: the judge because it was about the show. It wasn't
12:25
Speaker 4: about to go. It was about the show. They wanted
12:27
Speaker 4: the public to think that they were doing something about transparency.
12:30
Speaker 4: But the judge rule, as we all expected, the judge
12:33
Speaker 4: the rule. But even if the judge did produce these
12:36
Speaker 4: grand jury transcripts, I mean, it's really, as I said,
12:39
Speaker 4: just a portion of what the public wants. The public
12:42
Speaker 4: wants names. Grand jury transcripts wouldn't produce those names of
12:46
Speaker 4: third parties. It would just be the testimony that was
12:49
Speaker 4: written down and the exhibits that were provided inside the
12:53
Speaker 4: secret grand jury that led to Epstein's indictment. It's not
12:57
Speaker 4: going to be what implicates uncharged third parties. And so
13:03
Speaker 4: if you are waiting for the grand jury transcripts to
13:06
Speaker 4: answer your at Jeffrey Epstein questions, you'll be waiting a
13:10
Speaker 4: long time.
13:11
Speaker 1: There are still two judges in New York considering the
13:15
Speaker 1: government's requests to release the grand jury transcripts in the
13:19
Speaker 1: Epstein and Maxwell cases. They're taking more time and requesting
13:24
Speaker 1: more information. What do you think they're just not, you know,
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Speaker 1: denying them out of hand and saying grand jury secrecy.
13:32
Speaker 4: The rules up there in that circuit in New York
13:36
Speaker 4: are a little better for the public to get access
13:41
Speaker 4: to grand jury transcripts. There's there's a slight opening. It's
13:44
Speaker 4: not impossible. It's hard, but it's not impossible. So there's
13:48
Speaker 4: an outside chance that could happen up there. But as
13:50
Speaker 4: I said, even if you get them, they're going to
13:54
Speaker 4: be disappointing. They're going to be largely a nothing burger
13:56
Speaker 4: of people, and it probably suits Trump more if the
14:00
Speaker 4: judges just reject the request, then Trump can say, see,
14:03
Speaker 4: I tried, I try to be transparent. Blame those unelected
14:07
Speaker 4: liberal judges, even though he may have appointed some of them.
14:09
Speaker 4: But you can just blame the people wearing the black
14:13
Speaker 4: ropes who get lifetime appointments and carry the gabble. Much
14:15
Speaker 4: easier to do than to turn and shine the flashlight
14:19
Speaker 4: on yourself.
14:20
Speaker 1: And I want to get your reaction to the Trump
14:23
Speaker 1: administration falsely claiming that President Obama deliberately manufactured and politicized
14:31
Speaker 1: intelligence reports about Russian interference in the twenty sixteen election.
14:36
Speaker 1: I don't know how we got back to this point.
14:38
Speaker 1: Do you know what this is about?
14:39
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's about distraction. It's to take your mind off
14:42
Speaker 4: of the Jeffrey Epstein situation. So he has Pulsey Gabbert,
14:47
Speaker 4: who has no business being in government. Quite frankly, she's
14:50
Speaker 4: a hack. She's not qualified to be the director of
14:53
Speaker 4: D and I, and she's doing Pulsy Gabbert things by
14:56
Speaker 4: creating a story out of nothing. Even what she produced
15:01
Speaker 4: doesn't show what she says it shows. All shows is
15:04
Speaker 4: that Russia did not manipulate votes. They did not change
15:09
Speaker 4: the outcome of the election by the voting. But they did,
15:12
Speaker 4: and it's been proven over and over again, even by
15:15
Speaker 4: the report by Senator Marco Rubio's Senate Intelligence Committee that
15:18
Speaker 4: Russia did interfere with the election. They had a favorite
15:21
Speaker 4: in the election, Donald Trump, and they had a strategy
15:25
Speaker 4: that they implemented to get involved through spreading disinformation. But
15:30
Speaker 4: they didn't hack into voting machines. So I don't know
15:32
Speaker 4: what this thing is about that Tulsa Gabbert is trying
15:35
Speaker 4: to show, except it's nothing except for a distraction on
15:38
Speaker 4: the Jeffrey Epstein matter and approves why Tulsa Gabbard is
15:43
Speaker 4: unfit for office.
15:44
Speaker 1: Obama spokesman said these bizarre allegations are ridiculous and a
15:49
Speaker 1: weak attempt at distraction. I mean, this is not the
15:52
Speaker 1: first time that Trump has attacked Obama.
15:55
Speaker 4: Well, that's how he built his political career by claiming
15:58
Speaker 4: that Obama born in Kenya. This is why the magabase
16:02
Speaker 4: is so upset about this latest conspiracy theory, because they
16:07
Speaker 4: were led to believe that there are conspiracies under every
16:11
Speaker 4: mattress in DC, whether it's Obama being from Kenya, or
16:15
Speaker 4: the election of twenty twenty being stolen, or Jeffrey Epstein
16:18
Speaker 4: being part of a Democrat at cabal. But as the
16:22
Speaker 4: conspiracy theories get destroyed, the magabases is starting to wonder
16:27
Speaker 4: if they've been misled, if they've been made to look
16:31
Speaker 4: like fools, And they're understandably point their finger at their
16:37
Speaker 4: own team because their own team is the one who
16:39
Speaker 4: has led them astray.
16:41
Speaker 1: Turning to other legal news, one of the world's most
16:44
Speaker 1: vulnerable countries to the fallout from climate change has won
16:48
Speaker 1: a landmark legal battle, giving countries new ammunition to pursue
16:52
Speaker 1: some of the planet's biggest emitters. Joining me is environmental
16:57
Speaker 1: law expert Michael Girard, director of Columbia Law schools Saban
17:01
Speaker 1: Center for Climate Change Law, tell us about this decision
17:05
Speaker 1: by the International Court of Justice.
17:08
Speaker 5: So the International Court of Justice just issued a unanimous
17:11
Speaker 5: opinion by all fourteen of its judges on climate change.
17:16
Speaker 5: The decision said that climate change is a grave threat
17:20
Speaker 5: to humankind and many elements of international law require every
17:25
Speaker 5: country to act very strongly to try to fight climate change.
17:30
Speaker 1: And tell us about the case that was brought to
17:32
Speaker 1: years ago by.
17:33
Speaker 5: Vanuatu vano Watu, which is one of the small island
17:37
Speaker 5: nations in the Pacific that is really endangered by subl rise,
17:41
Speaker 5: who was able to organize an international effort and persuade
17:46
Speaker 5: the UN General Assembly to send to the International Court
17:50
Speaker 5: of Justice in the Hague questions about what are the
17:53
Speaker 5: obligations of countries to reduce their greenhouse assmentions and among
17:59
Speaker 5: other things, to save small island states and everybody else
18:03
Speaker 5: from the ravages of climate change.
18:05
Speaker 1: The ICJ doesn't have the power to enforce the decision
18:10
Speaker 1: on its own. US is among the countries that doesn't
18:14
Speaker 1: automatically recognize its legal authority. So what weight does this
18:19
Speaker 1: opinion have.
18:20
Speaker 5: That's right, the ICJ opinions in this kind of case
18:24
Speaker 5: our advisory. They don't have enforcement power. Many countries of
18:27
Speaker 5: the world do take the ICJ's decisions seriously, and we've
18:32
Speaker 5: already seen in quite a few countries around the world
18:36
Speaker 5: decisions by their own courts saying that their governments aren't
18:40
Speaker 5: doing enough. I think we'll see a lot more of
18:43
Speaker 5: those kinds of lawsuits all around the world. We'll see
18:46
Speaker 5: more lawsuits brought by environmental groups and others in their
18:51
Speaker 5: national courts saying that under the ICJ opinion and other
18:55
Speaker 5: legal doctrines, those countries are not doing enough to produce
18:59
Speaker 5: their green ask gas missions, and that could lead to
19:02
Speaker 5: enforcement by those national courts against those national governments.
19:07
Speaker 1: Last year, at least two hundred and twenty six new
19:09
Speaker 1: climate cases were brought. Are those mostly against countries? Are
19:14
Speaker 1: they against you know, corporations? You know? Where are they
19:18
Speaker 1: bringing these suits?
19:19
Speaker 5: They're mostly against countries, but very few of them are
19:22
Speaker 5: what we call strategic litigation, that is trying to get
19:24
Speaker 5: the country to act more broadly, Most of those lawsuits
19:28
Speaker 5: are concerning particular projects or our particular small actions. But
19:33
Speaker 5: we have seen strategic cases that are ordering countries to
19:38
Speaker 5: do more. We saw them in successful cases the Netherlands, Germany, France, Mexico, Nepal, Brazil,
19:47
Speaker 5: South Africa. Most recently Hungary, several other countries all around
19:51
Speaker 5: the world. We're seeing these kinds of cases, these kinds
19:54
Speaker 5: of decisions from the courts, and I think now we'll
19:57
Speaker 5: see more of them.
19:58
Speaker 1: And our countries complain vying with the results of these
20:01
Speaker 1: cases when they're decided.
20:04
Speaker 5: Not necessarily that's a very good question. We've seen that
20:08
Speaker 5: the countries are doing something but not necessarily enough, and
20:13
Speaker 5: frequently the plaintives go back to court to try to
20:16
Speaker 5: seek more specific enforcement. So the decisions do have a
20:20
Speaker 5: positive effect, but they're not completely solving the problem.
20:24
Speaker 1: Are there other international courts that are taking a stand
20:28
Speaker 1: on climate Yes.
20:30
Speaker 5: In the last year and a half or so, we've
20:32
Speaker 5: seen decisions from the European Court of Human Rights, the
20:36
Speaker 5: Inter American Court of Human Rights, and the International Tribunal
20:40
Speaker 5: on the Law of the Sea, and all three of
20:43
Speaker 5: those international tribunals also said that the countries have an
20:47
Speaker 5: obligation to reduce their green ass gas emissions and otherwise
20:51
Speaker 5: address climate change.
20:52
Speaker 1: Is litigation the best way forward for climate activists or
20:57
Speaker 1: negotiations ongoing anywhere?
21:00
Speaker 5: I wouldn't say that litigation is necessarily the best way.
21:03
Speaker 5: I think the best way is to try to get
21:06
Speaker 5: politicians to pass and implement strong laws, but in few
21:11
Speaker 5: countries as that actually happens. So litigation is one important
21:14
Speaker 5: part of the toolkit. It's not the biggest part, but
21:17
Speaker 5: it's one important part, and it just became a lot
21:20
Speaker 5: stronger with yesterday's decision.
21:22
Speaker 1: As far as the United States and the Trump administration,
21:26
Speaker 1: how has the Trump administration impacted the environment and environmental protections?
21:32
Speaker 5: Well, the Trump administration is basically a denying climate change,
21:36
Speaker 5: or at least that they have to do anything about it.
21:38
Speaker 5: They're working very hard to stop all of the actions
21:42
Speaker 5: that had been taken under previous administrations to control climate change.
21:47
Speaker 5: They again withdrew from the Paris Climate Agreement. So the
21:51
Speaker 5: Trump administration is very much moving backwards on all of this.
21:56
Speaker 1: Let's say that after Trump's term ends, there as a
22:00
Speaker 1: president who is more concerned about the environment. Can the
22:04
Speaker 1: Trump administration's actions be easily reversed.
22:08
Speaker 5: They can be reversed, but it will take time. Of course.
22:11
Speaker 5: In the first Trump administration they moved backwards, although not
22:14
Speaker 5: as faster as quickly, and then when Biden came in,
22:17
Speaker 5: they did reverse of that and secured passage of the
22:20
Speaker 5: Inflation Reduction Act, which Congress has now partly revoked. One
22:25
Speaker 5: of the big problems is loss of staff, loss of expertise,
22:29
Speaker 5: loss of scientific capability. That'll take some time to rebuild.
22:33
Speaker 5: So the legal issues most of us can be restored,
22:37
Speaker 5: but actually regaining the momentum is going to take time.
22:41
Speaker 5: We will have lost a lot of time that we
22:43
Speaker 5: don't have.
22:45
Speaker 1: What can environmental activists do is it file suits to
22:48
Speaker 1: try to slow down the Trump administration.
22:51
Speaker 5: Yes, and there's already a lot of that, and quite
22:54
Speaker 5: a few of those lossits have had early successes in
22:57
Speaker 5: the district court, serve in quite a few preliminary injunctions
23:00
Speaker 5: granted against what the Trump administration is doing. And those
23:04
Speaker 5: states that still care about climate change are doing a
23:07
Speaker 5: lot in New York, California, Massachusetts, Washington, Illinois, several other
23:12
Speaker 5: states are acting on their own to reduce their emissions.
23:16
Speaker 5: But I think the most important thing that needs to
23:18
Speaker 5: be done is is that nepolling place is to elect
23:21
Speaker 5: officials at every level, federal, state, and local, who really
23:25
Speaker 5: are going to act on climate change.
23:27
Speaker 1: I mean, how do climate deniers even support their position?
23:33
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean there's a small handful of climate deniers
23:37
Speaker 5: or climate not so batters, as I call them, are
23:39
Speaker 5: out there, several of whom have just been hired by
23:42
Speaker 5: the federal government to advise them. They're complete outliers in
23:46
Speaker 5: the scientific community, but there are a few of those
23:48
Speaker 5: out there, and there are some news media outlets that
23:51
Speaker 5: put that out. Nobody has the nerve. No lawyer goes
23:55
Speaker 5: to court denying climate change. They know that that would
23:58
Speaker 5: be a real loser, but we still see that in
24:01
Speaker 5: the political arena and in some media outlets.
24:04
Speaker 1: Thanks so much. That's Michael Gerard, director of Columbia Law
24:07
Speaker 1: school Saban Center for Climate Change Law. And that's it
24:12
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