Climate Activists Stoke Tension Over Biden’s Fossil Fuel Record

While President Joe Biden locked up re-election endorsements from four major conservation groups at the Anthem theater in Washington on June 14, a small group of activists outside protested what they see as his failures to deal with climate change.

Climate Defiance, a newly formed group that has embraced direct action and disruption as its means of stopping fossil fuel extraction on federal lands, is gearing up for a busy summer of action, says its founder, Michael Greenberg.

Biden’s March decision to greenlight the $8 billion Willow oil project in Alaska sparked Climate Defiance to disrupt public events featuring members of the administration and its allies, he said.

“We just want to hold Biden accountable,” Greenberg said in an interview. “He promised no new drilling on federal lands, and Willow is drilling on federal lands.”

Since it launched just three months ago, Climate Defiance has received attention for the disruption of high-profile events such as the White House Correspondents’ Association’s annual dinner in Washington, scoring hundreds of thousands of social media likes and millions of impressions along the way.

“Our power is in our ability to confront and expose and publicly shame people who are not doing what they need to be doing,” Greenberg said. “It’s the ability to expose people for their complicity.”

Climate Defiance members shouted down Ali Zaidi, Biden’s national climate adviser, during a speech in April; crashed Sen. Joe Manchin’s (D-W.Va.) keynote talk at a Semafor conference this month; and stormed Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm at Politico’s Energy Summit in May, culminating in members of the group being dragged out of the room by security.

The group is using its pressure to send a message, Greenberg said. They want an end to the extraction of fossil fuels on federal lands, for climate change to become a top-three issue in American politics, and for the Biden administration to follow through on the president’s campaign promises, Greenberg said.

“We look for projects that are salient, in the news, and of interest to people,” he said. “And if Democrats get control [in next year’s election], we’re going to focus on the Green New Deal.”

Climate Defiance’s concerns include the Willow project, the Mountain Valley Pipeline, which would cross Virginia and West Virginia, and the Alaska LNG project, Greenberg said. Climate Defiance is also considering directing future actions against the Enbridge Line 5 pipeline that passes under the Straits of Mackinac and the Line 3 proposed pipeline that would run through Minnesota, he said.

Because the group has so little overhead and its protests cost virtually nothing, it can plan and carry them out very quickly. For example, its rally outside the League of Conservation Voters’ dinner last week to protest Biden, the keynote speaker, was arranged the day before.

Results Unknown

So far it’s impossible to tell what effect, if any, Climate Defiance is having either on policymakers or public opinion, “because the way society responds is so complicated,” said Peter Kalmus, a NASA climate scientist who spoke on his own behalf.

Still, if an official avoids a public speaking event because Climate Defiance has threatened to show up, “that means they’ve deeply taken to heart the message that Climate Defiance wants them to,” Kalmus said.

Groups like Climate Defiance that are willing to work outside the system can shift climate policy and public opinion in ways mainstream environmental groups such as those that backed Biden last week can’t, political scientists say.

“The wider the range of different groups there are, trying a wide range of different tactics, the better it is, because you’re playing an inherently uncertain game,” said Hahrie Han, a professor of political science at Johns Hopkins University.

But Anthony Rogers-Wright, director of environmental justice at New York Lawyers for the Public Interest, questioned whether driving a speaker off a stage is really an effective action.

“I would rather be in a position where I could debate Joe Manchin,” he said. “What we need to do is dismantle his philosophy, not his voice. That’s my biggest critique—where is all of this leading to?”

Climate Defiance has won the support of some progressive members of Congress, including Reps. Rashida Tlaib (D-Minn.); Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), who recently thanked them in a tweet for “building the grassroots momentum” for a Green New Deal resolution; and Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.), who is scheduled to speak at the group’s fundraising event in Washington on Thursday.

“If we don’t get the policies we need, if our legislative process is failing us, direct action gets the goods,” Tlaib said during a Zoom meeting on June 18 with members of Climate Defiance and other groups.

The White House didn’t respond to an interview request to comment on Climate Defiance’s activities and concerns.

Another key challenge for Climate Defiance is to draw attention to the climate crisis while not alienating the general public with acts that are seen as morally outrageous, such as Just Stop Oil’s recent defacement of artworks in Europe, said Anthony Leiserowitz, founder of Yale University’s program on climate change communication.

The group has shown some willingness to antagonize the public, such as when it blocked a main artery in Brooklyn last month near Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s (D-N.Y.) home.

Those kinds of tactics are risky, because many people “are horrified by any law breaking,” said Dana Williams, a sociology professor at California State University, Chico, who studies political movements.

Still, Williams said it appears Climate Defiance is “far more interested in being effective than being concerned with a certain image. It’s a notable goal, but it remains to be seen if this can generate excitement and participation in cities that aren’t D.C.”

Oxygen for Big Greens

Mainstream environmental groups such as the Natural Resources Defense Council, Sierra Club, Earthjustice, the Center for Biological Diversity, and Food & Water Watch declined to comment about Climate Defiance.

Kalmus said groups willing to cause chaos and risk arrest can actually be helpful to the big environmentalists, because “they give them more space to negotiate. You need pressure from the outside to make the people with power a little bit uncomfortable, and for them to feel like they might lose elections.”

Erich Pica, president of Friends of the Earth—which sometimes stages protests—applauded Climate Defiance, saying protesting Biden officials by sending a highly visible public message is “just smart.”

Rogers-Wright added Climate Defiance has shifted his own thinking as a mainstream environmentalist.

“Climate Defiance is speaking to the people with influence and access, to push us on what we’re communicating to the president,” he said. “I accept responsibility for that. I’m hearing what they’re saying. They’re sending a message to me, too.”

For his part, Greenberg said he’s not concerned with fitting in with the environmentalist community.

“The big greens have failed to inspire ordinary people to engage in meaningful action,” he said. “Asking people to sign petitions is not enough. Asking people to donate is not enough. We need to engage people in a meaningful way. And if the big greens won’t do it, we will.”