Michael Mann beat his defamers however, climate scientists are still under attack.

by LAUREN KURTZ

FEBRUARY 28, 2024

Earlier this month, a Washington, D.C., jury held climate deniers liable for their falsehoods — a first, anywhere. The jury awarded over a million dollars in damages to climate scientist Michael Mann after finding that he had been repeatedly defamed by two bloggers. 

This case did not involve a run-of-the-mill scientific disagreement or even a heated yet good-faith dispute. Instead, it combined statements both grotesque (comparing Mann to convicted child abuser Jerry Sandusky) and already-disproven (claims that Mann committed research misconduct). 

The First Amendment gives broad leeway for free expression and exchange of opinions, even hostile and insulting ones. But there is a narrow exception when statements are untrue and damaging. In the case of public figures, which prominent scientist Mann was found to be, there is an additional threshold that the statements were made with a knowing or reckless disregard for the truth.

Here, the jury was clear that aggressively maintaining falsehoods in the face of repeated corrections is defamatory. Arguing that Mann committed scientific fraud was a losing battle — Mann’s climate research had already passed extreme scrutiny. Following the so-called Climategate email hacking in 2009, at least eight different official investigations into his and related research found no fraud or scientific misconduct. Moreover, Mann’s research has also been repeatedly corroborated by other scientists, leaving an undeniable scientific consensus that humans are causing climate change. 

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