A six-figure advertising campaign is calling on Congress to investigate the Environmental Law Institute (ELI) due to its relationships with Chinese entities, as State Armor renews its push for lawmakers to examine the organization’s funding, information-sharing activities, judicial education programs, and policy work in the United States.
The campaign includes a television ad airing in Washington, DC, mobile billboards on Capitol Hill and outside ELI’s headquarters, and targeted digital advertising.
Provided by State Armor
“China doesn’t always influence America directly. Sometimes it uses a middleman,” the ad states. “The Environmental Law Institute (ELI) provided special briefings for CCP [Chinese Communist Party] officials, trains American judges on climate litigation, promotes lawsuits targeting U.S. energy. The result: American energy restricted. Prices up. America more dependent on China. Hurting us, helping them. Whose side is ELI really on? It’s time for answers. Eliinchina.com.”
State Armor Founder and CEO Michael Lucci also sent a new letter to congressional leaders on September 16 renewing his request for an investigation into ELI.
The letter was addressed to Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Chairman Mike Lee, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Brett Guthrie, and House Select Committee on the Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party Chairman John Moolenaar.
WATCH THE AD HERE:
“In June, I wrote to you warning of serious concerns regarding the Environmental Law Institute and its longstanding relationship with China,” Lucci wrote. “As documented in my initial letter and State Armor’s report, ‘ELI and Communist China,’ ELI has spent decades working with Chinese government, academic, and legal institutions while simultaneously advancing policies in the United States that threaten American energy production, industrial growth, and national security.”
“The concerns raised in June have only grown more urgent,” Lucci continued.
“Our research found that ELI provided information and analysis to Chinese stakeholders, maintained extensive relationships with institutions connected to the People’s Republic of China, and potentially helped provide our foremost foreign adversary with access to American legal institutions,” he wrote.
“At the same time, ELI has educated thousands of American judges on climate-related issues and consistently advocated policies that constrain American energy development while largely sparing China from comparable scrutiny.”
Lucci then pointed to ELI’s position on data centers and the energy infrastructure needed to support artificial intelligence development.
“Now another troubling pattern is emerging,” Lucci wrote. “As concerns mount over Chinese efforts to undermine American leadership in artificial intelligence and advanced technology, ELI has positioned itself as a leading voice against the rapid development of data centers and the energy infrastructure necessary to power them.”
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“Once again, an organization with a long history of engagement with Chinese institutions is working to impede American development in a strategically critical industry while China races ahead.”
Lucci called on Congress to examine whether or not those activities are connected.
“Congress should determine whether these activities are merely coincidental or part of a broader and more troubling pattern,” he wrote.
“For that reason, I respectfully renew my request that Congress immediately investigate ELI, its funding, its relationships with Chinese entities, its information-sharing activities, its judicial education programs, and the extent to which those relationships may have influenced its policy work in the United States.”
Lucci also argued that ELI’s role in educating judges and participating in public policy debates warrants congressional examination.
“American nonprofit organizations, particularly those that have educated thousands of American judges and helped shape consequential public policy debates, should be subject to appropriate scrutiny when their activities may benefit a foreign adversary at America’s expense,” Lucci wrote. “Based on the evidence we have uncovered, ELI may represent one of the most sophisticated and least scrutinized potential avenues of Chinese influence operating within American legal and policy institutions.”
“Congress has both the authority and responsibility to determine the full extent of these relationships,” he added. “I urge you to open an investigation without delay.”
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Lucci also told Breitbart News, “ELI has allowed itself to be a middleman for Chinese influence here in America, and has carried out work that effectively advances the CCP’s geopolitical goals. On the one hand, ELI holds special briefings for CCP officials on America’s regulatory framework and teaches them best practices. Yet here in America it trains American judges on climate litigation and promotes lawsuits targeting U.S. energy companies. American energy production and industrial capacity have been restricted, all while America’s electric grid has become dependent upon Chinese technologies that we now know are pre-programmed to sabotage our grid. Congress needs to take a serious look at ELI’s actions and relationships with Communist China to determine if legal action should be taken.”
John Czwartacki, co-founder and principal of Public Policy Solutions, said in a statement provided to Breitbart News:
The Environmental Law Institute’s long-term engagement with Chinese entities, executed simultaneously with legal campaigns in the United States — all ostensibly in the name of climate action — should alarm us all. Now it seems they’ve adopted a new front in attacking America strength by opposing our AI infrastructure build out. One strategic campaign that hurts America and helps China is more than enough. Congress must investigate to understand how ELI has aligned so closely with Chinese strategic interests.
Several lawmakers have also commented on the allegations against ELI since State Armor released its July report.
“Judges that are trained by or work with Communist China have no place in our judicial system. If these allegations are true, they will be held accountable,” Sen. Tom Cotton said.
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Sen. Marsha Blackburn said, “There is absolutely no reason U.S. judges should receive training in far-left climate ideology — let alone from a group tied to the CCP.”
Moolenaar said, “The CCP is actively taking advantage of our open society and attempting to advance its malign influence across all levels of government… U.S. judges should closely vet the programs they participate in and never take part in training sponsored by CCP-linked United Front groups.”
State Armor’s July report said ELI’s Climate Judiciary Project had provided climate-related educational programming to more than 2,000 American judges since 2018. The organization alleged that the project targeted jurisdictions where climate lawsuits against energy companies were already underway and “primes courts to be instruments of climate activism.”
The report also identified ELI relationships with Chinese universities and government-linked institutions, including Wuhan University, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, China’s Supreme People’s Court, and the Ministry of Ecology. State Armor alleged that ELI’s China International Business Dialogue on Environmental Governance provides Chinese officials with “detailed analysis” of American and European environmental regulations.
Lucci told Breitbart News at the time that ELI’s relationship with China provides Chinese entities with updates on U.S. administrative and regulatory developments that serve “almost like intelligence briefings.” He questioned why, if ELI believes it can change China’s behavior through its information exchanges, “why wouldn’t China believe it can influence American energy policy through ELI?”