Press Releases

Whitehouse, Hirono, Feinstein, Warren File Amicus Brief Calling Out Koch-Backed Effort to Concentrate Power in the Hands of Right-Wing Justices

Loper plaintiffs and fossil-fuel-funded amici seek to tear down administrative state. Brief urges the Supreme Court to affirm D.C. Circuit and reject ‘decades-long effort by pro-corporate interests to eviscerate the federal government’s regulatory apparatus, to the detriment of the American people.’ New ProPublica report details Koch effort to bring Loper case while seeming to court Justice Thomas.

Yesterday, Senators Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Mazie Hirono (D-HI), Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) and Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) filed an amicus curiae —or “friend of the court”—brief in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, the Supreme Court case that asks the Court to overrule decades of settled precedent to curtail federal administrative agency authority at the behest of big corporate special interests.  Counsel of record for the senators is University of California, Berkeley School of Law Dean Erwin … Continue Reading

Senate Democrats Back Biden Administration’s Governmentwide Social Cost of Carbon Directive

Landmark policy to account for true costs of pollution will drive lower costs for American consumers and savings on federal disaster aid

Senate Democrats are lauding the Biden Administration’s historic decision to begin requiring use of a social cost of carbon across government decision-making.  A social cost of carbon is a science-based estimate of the damages caused by each ton of carbon pollution - including property losses, increased health care costs, and other harms that come with heat waves, drought, heavy rains, sea level rise, habitat shifts, ocean warming, and acidification. Senate Democrats released the following stat… Continue Reading

Whitehouse Lauds Biden Administration’s Governmentwide Social Cost of Carbon Directive

Landmark policy to account for true costs of pollution will drive lower costs for American consumers and savings on federal disaster aid

U.S. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, today lauded the Biden Administration’s historic decision to begin requiring use of a social cost of carbon across government decision-making.  A social cost of carbon is a science-based estimate of the damages caused by each ton of carbon pollution - including property losses, increased health care costs, and other harms that come with heat waves, drought, heavy rains, sea-level rise, habitat shifts, ocean warming,… Continue Reading

In the News

‘The Scheme’: a senator’s plan to highlight rightwing influence on the supreme court

Sheldon Whitehouse spent nine years rousing the Senate to act on climate change. Now he’s set his sights on the changes at the supreme court

The US Senate is not a crowded, rambunctious place like Britain's House of Commons or other more lively legislative bodies around the world. Members are accustomed to speaking among row after row of empty desks, unheckled by absent colleagues. This has not deterred Senator Sheldon Whitehouse from stepping into the arena to champion urgent causes. For almost nine years the Democrat took to the Senate floor every week the chamber was in session to demand that attention be paid to the climate cris… Continue Reading

This senator thought he had given his 279th and final speech on climate change. He was wrong.

With climate action stalled, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse is reviving his "Time to Wake Up" speeches.

A little over a year ago, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, a Democrat from Rhode Island, stood on the Senate floor looking exuberant. To his right was his trademark green sign - a picture of the Earth and "TIME TO WAKE UP" in large capital letters. The senator, a longtime climate activist, was celebrating what he thought would be a milestone: his 279th and final speech urging the country to take action on global warming. President Joe Biden, who had campaigned aggressively on the subject of climate c… Continue Reading

This member of Congress wants everyone to know about the 'dark money scheme' that's 'captured' the Supreme Court

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse is fighting to end the "dark money" that he says is plaguing the Supreme Court. The Rhode Island Democrat is referring to private groups using anonymous donations to advance their interests at the highest court.

For the ninth time this year, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse gave a speech this week blasting right-wing anonymous donors whom he believes have "captured" the Supreme Court and "built" its current 6-3 conservative majority. "Our Supreme Court is awash in dark money influence," the Rhode Island Democrat said on the Senate floor on Tuesday. "The American people may not be able to see all of the rot, but they can see enough to know that something is rotten over there across First Street at that court." … Continue Reading

Speeches

The Scheme 23: Let's Say

Mr. President, I will call this my ‘‘let’s say’’ speech. Lawyers know what a hypothetical is. We will talk about some hypotheticals related to the scheme to capture the Court. Let’s say, Mr. President, that you are a creepy billionaire and it is your plan to capture and control the Supreme Court, to take it over just like 19thcentury robber barons would have taken over and captured the railroad commission that set the rates for their own railroad. Let’s say you sent millions of dollars—secret … Continue Reading

Time to Wake Up 289: Rising Tides, Rising Temps

Mr. President, this is the 289th time that I have come to the Senate floor with my increasingly battered ‘‘Time to Wake Up’’ chart, to stir this Chamber to act on climate change. Since 2016, I have been talking about the zettajoule. The zettajoule is the measure of how much fossil fuel emissions are heating up our oceans. In this season of extreme, record-smashing heat touching all 50 States, it is wild that elected representatives in Washington still choose to insulate t… Continue Reading

The Scheme 22: Justice Alito and the Polluter Page

Mr. President, I rise this evening, now for the 22nd time, to keep unmasking the far-right scheme to capture and control our Supreme Court. This scheme is funded by creepy rightwing billionaires who stay out of the limelight and let others- namely, Leonard Leo and his crew-operate their scheme. How are they benefiting from the scheme? It is hard to track which rightwing billionaires are involved- and that is by design-but thanks to intrepid reporting from ProPublica and others, we are learning m… Continue Reading

Op-Eds

Climate Systemic Risks Are Mounting

Climate change is not only destroying lives and livelihoods, but also introducing new systemic risks to the financial system and the broader economy. The warning signs of another 2008-scale financial crisis are flashing red across multiple economic sectors, and behind them looms the collapse of Earth’s natural systems.

This June was the hottest on record, and it was followed by the hottest-ever week in early July, which then turned out to be the hottest month on record. Canada’s unprecedented wildfires blanketed huge swaths of North America in smoke; storms in Vermont, New York, and Pennsylvania triggered deadly floods; the Midwest has been experiencing its worst drought in over a decade; Europe is baking; China hit record-high temperatures; and Italy suffered its worst flooding in 100 years.  Climate change … Continue Reading

This Obscure Judicial Agency Could Tighten Ethics for Justices

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) writes that the Judicial Conference of the United States could strengthen the ethics rules that apply to the US Supreme Court justices—without additional authorization from Congress.

The US Supreme Court is likely to make history this month on issues like affirmative action and voting rights, but this term may ultimately be defined by ethics scandals and questions surrounding the justices. As the justices drag their feet on making changes, a little-known agency within the judicial branch of government could have an outsize role in ethical reform. The Judicial Conference of the United States administers laws that Congress has passed regarding judicial ethics. In ad… Continue Reading

Strong Implementation of Bipartisan Law Key to Cleaning Up U.S. Financial System

A little sunlight truly is the best disinfectant. There may be nowhere that statement is more true than in the realm of illicit finance. By the Treasury Department's estimate, dirty money flowing through the American economy is equivalent to 2 percent of our GDP each year. Whether it takes the form of Russian oligarchs hiding sanctioned assets in American real estate, or international drug cartels stashing the proceeds of their crimes in Delaware trusts, the dirty money is dangerous to our saf… Continue Reading