By Dawn Chmielewski
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, July 19 (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump called for a review related to the Federal Judicial Center’s scientific reference manual in cases involving climate change, writing in a Truth Social post on Sunday that the work contains “discredited” information that led to “huge losses” for the country.
“Our Nation’s Federal Judges deserve Facts and Science, not Political Fraud and False Science on Climate,” Trump posted. “With this TRUTH, I hereby order Federal Suspension and Debarment Officials to review this conduct.”
It was not immediately clear what “conduct” Trump wants investigated. The White House did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
Earlier this year, the U.S. federal judiciary withdrew a chapter from the newest edition of its reference manual on scientific evidence that addressed climate change after Republican state attorneys general argued it was biased against fossil fuel companies.
The Federal Judicial Center, the judiciary’s research arm, incorporated a chapter addressing climate change as part of a long-planned update of the manual, the fourth edition of which was released in December. Judges rely on the manual when grappling with cases involving scientific testimony.
The section at issue in the fourth edition of the FJC’s Reference Manual for Scientific Evidence was authored by Jessica Wentz and Radley Horton of Columbia Law School and was drafted to “help judges evaluate the admissibility and weight of expert testimony and documentary evidence involving climate science.”
The Federal Judicial Center jointly produced the manual with the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.
(Reporting by Dawn Chmielewski in Los Angeles and Trevor Hunnicutt in Washington; Editing by Sergio Non and Kevin Buckland)
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