Day 937: "Special treatment."
1/ A Montana judge ruled that the state’s oil and gas policies failed to consider climate change when approving energy projects, violating young people’s constitutional right to a “clean and healthful environment.” District Court Judge Kathy Seeley found that a provision in the Montana Environmental Policy Act had harmed the state’s environment and the plaintiffs – a group of 16 kids, teens, and young adults. It was the first-of-its kind youth-led climate trial. In the ruling, Seeley wrote that “Montana’s emissions and climate change have been proven to be a substantial factor in causing climate impacts to Montana’s environment and harm and injury” to the youth. Montana is one of three states that have the affirmative right to a safe environment in their constitutions. (Bloomberg / Associated Press / Politico / Washington Post / New York Times / Wall Street Journal)
-
Small changes in global average temperature are driving environmental and economic consequences. (Bloomberg)
-
The clean energy future is arriving faster than you think. “Wind and solar power are breaking records, and renewables are now expected to overtake coal by 2025 as the world’s largest source of electricity. Automakers have made electric vehicles central to their business strategies and are openly talking about an expiration date on the internal combustion engine. Heating, cooling, cooking and some manufacturing are going electric.” (New York Times)
2/ An Atlanta area grand jury started hearing evidence against Trump and others in the 2020 election subversion case. Multiple witnesses were spotted and testified before the grand jury today, including two former state lawmakers. Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is expected to seek more than a dozen indictments in the case. Meanwhile, a list of criminal charges against Trump briefly appeared on a Fulton County website, which included conspiracy, false statements, forgery and, racketeering. Prosecutors, however, said Trump had not been indicted (yet?) and the Fulton County Clerk called the document “fictitious.” The two-page docket was then removed from the Fulton County court’s website. In July 2022, Willis notified 16 Trump electors that they were targets of the investigation. At least eight of them reached immunity deals that allow them to avoid prosecution if they cooperated. Trump is the first former U.S. president to face criminal charges, having been indicted in three separate cases, which total 78 charges: 44 federal charges and 34 state charges, all of them felonies, in three jurisdictions. (New York Times / CNN / Washington Post / ABC News / Wall Street Journal / Reuters / Associated Press / CNBC)
-
Georgia prosecutors have text messages and emails showing Trump’s team was behind the January 2021 voting system breach in Coffee County. “On January 1, 2021 – days ahead of the January 7 voting systems breach – Katherine Friess, an attorney working with Giuliani, Sidney Powell and other Trump allies, shared a ‘written invitation’ to examine voting systems in Coffee County with a group of Trump allies.” (CNN)
-
How Trump Tried to Overturn the Vote. “The Georgia case assembled by Ms. Willis offers a vivid reminder of the extraordinary lengths taken by Mr. Trump and his allies to exert pressure on local officials to overturn the election.” (New York Times)
-
How Donald Trump tried to undo his loss in Georgia in 2020. “In phone calls, speeches, tweets and media appearances, Trump and his allies pushed to overturn the 2020 election results in six swing states where certified results declared Joe Biden the winner, an effort that culminated in the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol as Congress convened to confirm the results.” (Washington Post)
3/ Trump attacked the judge handling his election conspiracy case – despite being warned that he refrain from “inflammatory” attacks against those involved in his case. Three days after District Judge Tanya Chutkan warned Trump she would “take whatever measures are necessary to safeguard the integrity of these proceedings,” Trump posted on his personal social media site that Chutkan was “highly partisan” and “very biased & unfair,” adding that “she obviously wants me behind bars.” When Chutkan issued a protective order governing evidence and restricting what Trump could say publicly, she said that Trump’s “political campaign has to yield to the orderly administration of justice […] that’s how it has to be.” Prosecutors have requested a trial date of Jan. 2. (USA Today / Politico / Washington Post / CNN / New York Times / CNBC / Washington Post / CBS News / ABC News)
4/ Federal prosecutors accused Trump of seeking “special treatment that no other defendant would receive” in the Mar-a-Lago classified documents case. Trump constructed sensitive compartmented information facility in one of his homes in order to review and discuss classified information in the case. Prosecutors, however, told a judge that “creating a secure location in Trump’s residence — which is also a social club — so he can discuss classified information would be an unnecessary and unjustified accommodation that deviates from the normal course of cases involving classified discovery.” (CNBC)