We don’t think climate criminals should go to jail if they want to constructively be part of fixing the future. Our system of excessive incarceration has been abused by the powerful and harmed many innocent people. We encourage reparative justice options to the climate criminals including community service to communities that have been most harmed. 

We want climate criminals to take personal responsibility for their role in delaying action on climate change. We want them to bring urgency to act at the speed of climate change to reduce emissions and shift course to avert the worst scenarios of present and future climate disruption. We want them to recognize the massive wealth they have made destroying the Earth and future possibilities and redirect it toward fixing the future. To atone for and repair their crimes, they must devote their lives to restitution and healing, including community service to communities that have been most harmed. 

Take Action! There are four actions we are urging you to take:

1. Learn the Names of the Climate Criminals. Every time you suffer through a heat wave, flood, or wildfire smoke, we want you to think of the climate criminals. They chose this path for us. Every time you pay higher taxes to clean up from climate disasters, we want you to think: why aren’t the climate criminals paying for this? Tell your friends and neighbors about the climate criminals.

2. Protest the Climate Criminals. When these climate criminals appear in public, let’s engage in nonviolent protest to hold them accountable. If a climate criminal comes to your community, organization, or college, let’s greet them with a friendly protest. Issue a CITIZEN’s WARRANT for their arrest. Show up with WANTED POSTERS. (Download some of ours here!)

3. Join the Call for U.S. Congressional Leaders to Convene Hearings on Climate Crimes. We believe US lawmakers should subpoena the climate criminals and question them about their actions and inaction. Identify the individuals responsible for climate denial, delay, and blocking alternatives.

4. Join the Global Citizens Call for an International Climate Crimes Tribunal. Sign our petition to the Office of the Prosecutor at the International Criminal Court in the Netherlands calling for investigation and prosecution of climate criminals. For every 10,000 signatures, we will send an updated communication.

We identified over 300 individuals who have played historical and present roles suggested by individuals and organizations that are actively working to avert climate catastrophe. We conducted extensive research into their backgrounds and the potential charges against them.

We have then further awarded some of these individuals specific titles based on the nature of their crimes:

1. Oilgarchs: Members of Trump’s Cabinet or Mega-donors with explicit ties to the fossil fuel industry

2. “Lifetime Achievement” actors who have earned a spot in our “Hall of Shame” for their role in driving climate destruction over the last couple decades

For our full methodology, click here.

We had to start somewhere. We have focused our initial research on North American climate criminals, as they are often international drivers of climate disruption. We hope to eventually expand our directory to include international climate criminals. If you have someone in mind, please nominate them here.

Yes and no. We are all responsible for doing our part to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions, especially those of us in global northern industrialized countries whose prosperity and consumption have been fueled by a century of burning oil, gas, and coal. But certain individuals have had considerable power, agency, and wealth to promote climate denial, sow doubt about science, block alternatives, and delay action on climate change. They have locked our planet onto an ecological collision course.

The climate criminals here have worked to limit our individual agency. There is an important reason why you can’t take high-speed rail or purchase an affordable electric vehicle: for decades, these corporations (and the individuals who lead them) have actively worked to block green alternatives, oppose higher automobile emission standards, and thwart the transition to a green energy economy. They have used their power and lobbying clout to capture our political system and block policy changes that would have changed our national trajectory decades ago. They have knowingly profited from degrading and jeopardizing our planetary future.

Corporations are led by people who make choices. Within corporations, there are individual leaders and decision-makers with tremendous latitude and power to influence choices and directions for the company. Each of us must make ethical decisions and choices about how much we cooperate with harmful systems.