U.S. Judicial Agency Removes Climate Science Chapter After Political Pushback

A dispute between a coalition of state attorneys general and the Federal Judicial Center led to the removal of a chapter on climate science from an advisory publication intended to help judges evaluate technical evidence. The attorneys general charged that the chapter framed several mainstream scientific conclusions as settled law despite ongoing legal challenges that contest those points, and objected to the chapter's reliance on an international scientific assessment and certain recent studies. They also criticized prescriptive legal suggestions and the prominence given to a narrow set of research findings that, they argued, lacked broader corroboration. Rather than propose targeted edits, the complainants sought wholesale withdrawal, asserting that even an accurate synthesis of mainstream science was inappropriate in the context of the document. The FJC excised the chapter, though references to the topic remain in the publication's foreword. The removal eliminates a centralized, institutionally sanctioned primer that could have offered judges a neutral starting point for interpreting climate-related evidence. Without it, courts may be more likely to resolve scientific disputes through adversarial expert presentations and contested evidentiary skirmishes, increasing variability across jurisdictions and elevating litigation costs. This episode occurs against a broader backdrop of legal scrutiny of advisory processes: recent litigation under the Federal Advisory Committee Act challenged a Department of Energy advisory panel for lack of balance and transparency, producing a court rebuke that highlights how procedural failings invite judicial intervention and reputational harm. That parallel case underscores that agencies and institutions cannot simply dissolve or retract contested guidance to avoid scrutiny; procedural and disclosure practices themselves are increasingly subject to legal challenge. For judicial educators and agencies that convene expert input, the confluence of content-focused pushback and process-oriented litigation may prompt more cautious approaches to producing guidance, tighter documentation of deliberations and sourcing, and heightened attention to perceived neutrality. Over time, the absence of an accepted, court-facing synthesis of the relevant science could slow coherent legal development in environmental cases and push more disputes toward appellate review, while also encouraging litigants to treat scientific issues primarily as tactical legal controversies rather than technical matters best resolved through neutral expertise.