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Washington, D.C. (April 30, 2024)—Today, Rep. Jamie Raskin, Ranking Member of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, and Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, Chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, released a joint staff report, entitled “Denial, Disinformation, and Doublespeak: Big Oil’s Evolving Efforts to Avoid Accountability for Climate Change.” Today’s report marks a major milestone in a multi-year investigation—initiated by House Oversight Committee Democrats and now a joint investigation with the Senate Budget Committee—and unveils new documents exposing the fossil fuel industry’s role in spreading climate disinformation and preventing action on climate change.
“The Budget Committee has heard warnings from credible experts about climate-caused economic shocks—many of which are already raising costs for families—and our joint investigation with the House Oversight Committee Democrats reveals new details about the disinformation campaign Big Oil is waging to obstruct action on climate safety,” said Chairman Whitehouse. “For decades, the fossil fuel industry has known about the economic and climate harms of its products but has deceived the American public to keep collecting more than $600 billion each year in subsidies while raking in record-breaking profits. As this joint report makes clear, the industry’s outright denial of climate change has evolved into a green-seeming cover for its ongoing covert operation—a campaign of deception, disinformation, and doublespeak waged using dark money, phony front groups, false economics, and relentless exertion of political influence—to block climate progress.”
“The evidence uncovered by Oversight Committee Democrats shows that Big Oil has run campaigns to confuse and mislead the public while working unceasingly to lock down a fossil fuel future,” said Ranking Member Raskin. “The climate crisis is now a civilizational emergency. Today’s joint report demonstrates that Big Oil continues to conceal the facts about their business model and obscure the actual dangers of fossil fuels, including natural gas, in order to block the climate action we need. Despite knowing about the devastating effects of their oil and gas products on the planet for decades, the industry has always prioritized its bottom line and chosen low-road PR tactics over a high-road commitment to addressing the crisis.”
The joint report makes the following key findings:
Background
New Materials
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