By JOEL B. POLLAK
The New York Times reported Friday that the wave of worldwide protests against climate change is partly being paid for by the Climate Emergency Fund, which is funded by a mega-wealthy trio that includes “the Kennedys and the Gettys.”
The co-founders are Trevor Neilson, Rory Kennedy, and Aileen Getty — whose family fortune, ironically, was made in the oil business. Their money funds protests staged by “Extinction Rebellion” and other groups, the Times notes:
Since its founding in July, the Climate Emergency Fund has distributed grants, (some as small as $2,000) to dozens of groups, including 350.org and others tied to the youth climate strikes last week. Extinction Rebellion has chapters around the world and has brought intense attention to climate change through disruptive protests in London in April, and subsequent protests in Los Angeles, New York City and elsewhere. It got a pledge of $350,000.
All three are residents of Malibu, California, one of the wealthiest communities in the United States — though the three portray themselves as victims of climate change, since their property was threatened by last year’s wildfires. (Scientists have cast doubt on the link between climate change and recent fires, calling it “noble-cause corruption.”)
All three say that they wanted to go beyond traditional politics to deliver a more urgent message to politicians.
The Times quotes Neilson as saying that he would cut off funding to any group that broke the law. However, one of the recipients of Climate Emergency Fund cash, Roger Hallam, a co-founder of Extinction Rebellion, told the Times that he believed breaking the law was all right as a matter of “civil disobedience,” as long as it was non-violent and non-destructive. “Sometimes it’s common sense that you have to cause harm to prevent a greater harm,” he told the Times.
Last week’s climate protest in Washington, DC, deliberately aimed to bring the city to a “standstill,” causing irate residents stuck in the traffic to object that the activists were making them late for work and for school. The D.C. Metropolitan Police Department told Breitbart News that “intentionally blocking traffic is not lawful activity.”
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News. He earned an A.B. in Social Studies and Environmental Science and Public Policy from Harvard College, and a J.D. from Harvard Law School. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. He is also the co-author of How Trump Won: The Inside Story of a Revolution, which is available from Regnery. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
