Senate Democrats announced last week that they will hold a “hearing” this Tuesday on “dark money and barriers to climate action” in the latest event in their week-long effort to capitalize on the trial between the New York attorney general and ExxonMobil. The move falls in line with their other recent plays in the failed “Exxon Knew” campaign, like the lawsuit against ExxonMobil from the Massachusetts attorney general and the recycled climate hearing in the Subcommittee on Civil Rights and Civil Liberties.

The “hearing”—scheduled to take place on Tuesday afternoon—will be a retread of the same tired arguments legislators have listened to for years. It’s important to note that this isn’t an actual committee hearing, as the Senate Democrats have failed to get any Republicans to participate in their charade. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) is leading the non-partisan exercise, and uncoincidentally, the theme of ending “dark money” in climate action aligns with disclosure legislation he’s been trying to generate support for (unsuccessfully) month-after-month.

The entire affair is shaping up to very closely mimic last week’s Subcommittee hearing as well as the ongoing trial in New York City. These attacks are, of course, a part of a highly coordinated campaign to draw as much attention to the issue as possible, likely to distract from the disastrous showing by the New York attorney general’s office in court.

Nevertheless, legislators will call on the same worn-out cast of characters for their “expert” testimony about the #ExxonKnew sham.

The Usual Crowd

Naomi Oreskes

The most significant witness is Naomi Oreskes, an original mastermind of the “Exxon Knew” campaign and organizer of the infamous La Jolla conference where the idea for the controversy was initially created. She is also a master at manipulating research to fit her anti-energy narrative and is a seasoned witness in Congress,.

She recently came under intense fire at the Subcommittee hearing last week when Representative Chip Roy (R-TX-21) pressed her on the inherent bias in her “Exxon Knew” study:

Rep. Roy: “Dr. Oreskes, a quick question. Would you agree with the statement that scientific studies should be conducted in a manner that doesn’t dictate results and with a methodology that avoids bias by researchers, as a general matter? Yes, no?”

Oreskes: “Yes.”

Rep. Roy: “Is it true that in 2015-2016, before you conducted the report that has been discussed a lot, that you tweeted ‘Did Exxon deliberately mislead the public on climate change? Hello, of course they did’ and that you tweeted ‘Exxon’s actions may have imperiled all of humanity. It’s time to divest.’ Yes or no, did you tweet those things prior to your report?”

Oreskes: “I believe it was after the report but I could check on that.”

Rep. Roy: “Well I’ve got data that shows those tweets were before your 2017 report.”

Energy In Depth’s investigation of Oreskes’s 2017 “Exxon Knew” paper also uncovered blatant inconsistencies in her research that she was taken to task for by Representative Carol Miller (R-WV-03). In addition to displaying her bias against ExxonMobil before undertaking her study, Oreskes cherry-picked documents and largely compared the climate research of Exxon with the advertorials of Mobil before the two companies merged. At last week’s hearing neither she nor her partner were able to even offer a guess at what year the two companies merged, a stunning omission for two Harvard historians.

Justin Farrell

A professor at Yale specializing in the “environment, politics, and human culture,” Justin Farrell is an ally of Oreskes and counts Senator Whitehouse among his biggest fans. According to his resume, his academic work focuses on uncovering “dark money” in philanthropy and politics, and his department is conveniently funded by the Rockefellers, who fund every aspect of the “Exxon Knew” campaign.

In December 2015, just weeks after the Rockefeller-financed “Exxon Knew” stories from InsideClimate News and the Columbia School of Journalism appeared publicly, Farrell released a report suggesting that “corporate funding” to more than 160 so-called “climate counter movement” institutions was largely responsible for skepticism about climate science. However, many of the groups Farrell accused of climate denial have actually embraced climate mitigation policies.

Other attendees will include Morton Rosenberg, a scholar at the Project on Government Oversight – another Rockefeller-funded operation that also receives funding from several other “Exxon Knew” funders, including the park Foundation and Wallace Global Fund. Dylan Tanner, the executive director and co-founder of Influence Map, will also be testifying. Tanner and his organization have accused large energy producers, including ExxonMobil, of opposing climate regulations