The facts are indisputable. The science is clear. The consequences are already here. Yet, as wildfires scorch the West, hurricanes batter the coasts, and children gasp through heatwaves in crumbling classrooms, the United States government continues to fail its most sacred duty: to protect its people.
Progressive firebrand Lisa McCormick has issued a damning indictment of this dereliction, accusing Congress and the Environmental Protection Agency of violating the constitutional rights of America’s youth through their staggering inaction on climate change.
McCormick’s argument echoes the haunting, unfinished battle of Juliana v. United States—the landmark lawsuit filed on August 12, 2015, in which 21 young Americans sued their government for knowingly endangering their future.
The case was simple. The stakes were existential. The children argued that by fueling the climate crisis through reckless policies and unchecked emissions, the U.S. government had violated their Fifth Amendment rights to life, liberty, and property. Federal courts agreed—at first. In a blistering 2016 ruling, Judge Ann Aiken declared climate change a “dire threat” and affirmed that the plaintiffs had a constitutional right to a stable climate.
But justice was delayed, then denied. After years of legal wrangling, the Ninth Circuit dismissed the case in 2020, not on the merits, but on procedural cowardice. The court admitted the children’s claims were valid—that climate change poses “a genuine existential threat”—yet still ruled that the judiciary could not force the political branches to act.
McCormick’s charge is blunt: That dismissal was a death sentence.
“Ten years ago, on August 12, 2015, 21 brave young Americans stood up in federal court and did what our government refused to do—they told the truth,” said McCormick. “They told the truth about the wildfires that would choke our skies. They told the truth about the rising seas that would swallow our coasts. They told the truth about the storms that would wipe entire towns off the map. And most damning of all, they told the truth about the politicians and polluters who knew it was coming—and did nothing to stop it.”
Since 2020, carbon emissions have climbed. Oil and gas production has hit record highs.
The EPA, tasked with safeguarding public health, moved at a glacial pace when Democrats were in power, its regulations routinely weakened by industry lobbying and political paralysis. After Republicans took over, the EPA mounted an all-out assault on the planet’s capacity to sustain life.
Meanwhile, American children breathe toxic air, flee climate-driven disasters, and inherit a world destabilized by the very leaders sworn to protect them.
“The Constitution does not allow the government to knowingly poison its citizens,” McCormick argues. “When Congress subsidizes fossil fuels, when the EPA greenlights new drilling, when courts shrug and say ‘this isn’t our problem,’ they are condemning children to a future of chaos—and that is a moral and legal crime.”
The science underscores her fury.
A 2023 study in Nature confirmed that a child born today will endure seven times as many climate disasters as their grandparents.
Heatwaves stunt cognitive development. Wildfire smoke erodes lung function. Rising seas swallow communities whole. These are not hypotheticals—they are lived realities, and they fall disproportionately on the young, the poor, and communities of color.
Yet Washington’s response remains a mix of empty rhetoric and half-measures.
The Inflation Reduction Act was both historic and inadequate. That law still permits massive new oil and gas projects. Carbon capture subsidies flow to polluters. Environmental justice initiatives are underfunded and delayed.
“Trump’s EPA falsely touts $1 billion in annual savings from gutting power plant pollution rules—a corporate windfall that erases $20 billion in public health and climate benefits, forcing Americans to pay with their lungs and livelihoods while polluters profit, betraying the agency’s very name,” said McCormick.
McCormick’s demand is unambiguous: Revive the spirit of Juliana. Enforce the Constitution’s guarantee of a livable future. Sue the government again if necessary. And if the courts won’t act, then the people must—through protests, strikes, and an electoral reckoning for every politician who trades children’s lives for corporate donations.
McCormick also faulted Senator Cory Booker and Congressman Frank Pallone for ignoring the opportunity to make laws that embody the spirit of the children’s lawsuit.
The clock is ticking. The world is burning. And history will judge this era not by the excuses of leaders, but by the scars left on a generation betrayed.
The question now is whether America will finally heed their cries—or let them drown in the rising tide.