Three States Pushing ALEC Bill To Require Teaching Climate Change Denial In Schools

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The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC)ย –ย known by its critics as a โ€œcorporate bill millโ€ – has hit the ground running in 2013, pushing โ€œmodels billsโ€ย mandating the teaching of climate change denial in public schoolย systems.ย 

January hasn’t even ended, yet ALEC has already planted itsย โ€Environmental Literacy Improvement Actโ€ย – which mandates a โ€œbalancedโ€ teaching of climate science in K-12 classrooms –ย in the state legislatures of Oklahoma, Colorado, and Arizona so far thisย year.ย 

In the past five years since 2008, among the hottest years in U.S. history, ALEC has introduced its โ€œEnvironmental Literacy Improvement Actโ€ย in 11 states, or over one-fifth of the statehouses nationwide. Theย bill has passedย inย four states,ย an undeniable form of โ€œbig governmentโ€ this โ€œfree marketโ€ organization decriesย in its own literature.

ALEC‘sย โ€œmodel billsโ€ are written by and for corporate lobbyists alongside conservative legislators at its annual meetings. ALEC raises much of its corporate funding from the fossil fuel industry, which in turn utilizes ALEC as a key – though far from the only – vehicle to ram through its legislative agenda through in theย states.ย 

A Frankenstein Co-Created with Heartlandย Institute

Aย DeSmogBlogย investigation last year found that theย Environmental Literacy Improvement Act’s orgins date back to 2000.

The Act’s creation isย directly connected to the ongoing efforts of another corporate-funded group, the Heartland Institute – of โ€œHeartland Institute Exposedโ€ fame – a group well plugged into the climate change denialย machine.ย 

ALEC‘s Natural Resources Task Force, now known as itsย Energy, Environment and Agriculture Task Force,ย adopted this model at a time when the Task Force was headed byย Sandy Liddy Bourne.ย Bourne, who served in this capacity from 1999-2004, would eventually ascend to the role ofย Director of Legislation and Policy for ALEC in 2004.ย 

Upon leaving ALEC in 2006, Bourne become Heartland’s Vice President for Policy Strategy. Today she serves as Executive Director of theย American Energy Freedom Center, an outfit sheย co-headsย with Arthur G. Randol. Randol isย a longtime lobbyist and PR flack for ExxonMobil, a corporation which endowed the climate change denial machine for years.

Heartland’s website still lists Bourne as one of its โ€œexperts,โ€ stating thatย โ€Under her leadership, 20 percent of ALEC model bills were enacted by one state or more, up from 11ย percent.โ€ย 

Importantly, Heartland is still a member of ALEC‘sย Energy, Environment and Agriculture Task Forceย that originally passed theย Environmental Literacy Improvement Act.

According to internal documents leaked to and published byย DeSmogBlogย in Feb. 2012, Heartland obtained funding for a โ€œGlobal Warming Curriculum for K-12 Classroomsโ€ project beginning in 2012. This cirruculum aims to teach that there โ€œis a major controversy over whether or not humans are changing theย weather.โ€

If this sounds similar to ALEC‘s model bill, it should, given the fact that the two outfits share funding from the same honey pot. In fact, Heartland actively promotes the ALEC model on itsย website.ย 

Model Bill Introduced in OK, CO, and AZ

Oklahoma and Coloradoย came first and within just over a week, Arizona followed suit in proposing the ALEC climate science โ€œmis-educationโ€ย bill.

Oklahoma: Sooner Rather thanย Later

On Jan. 18,ย the Sooner State’s legislatureย took the lead for 2013 in pushing the ALEC climate change education model in the form of HB 1674, the โ€œScientific Education and Academic Freedom Act.โ€ย 

HB 1674 calls for the teaching of โ€œscientific strengths and scientific weaknesses of existing scientific theories,โ€ including of global warming, saying it’s a theory steeped in โ€œcontroversyโ€ – not that the actual scientific record thinks so.

This is necessary, the bill states, โ€œto help students develop critical thinking skills they need in order to become intelligent, productive, and scientifically informed citizens,โ€ going on to explain that it’s important to explore โ€œdifferences of opinion on scientificย issues.โ€ย 

The ALEC model similarly calls for the teaching of โ€œcritical thinking so that students will be able to fairly and objectively evaluate scientificโ€ฆcontroversies.โ€ The model also mandates creation of โ€œan atmosphere of respect for different opinions and open-mindedness to new ideasโ€ in the scientificย sphere.ย 

The OK bill is sponsored by Rep. Gus Blackwell (R-61), unsurprisngly a dues-payingย member of ALEC.ย According to a Dec. 2012 report published by theย Center for Media and Democracyย (CMD) titled, โ€œBuying Influence,โ€ Blackwell has paid for his attendance at least one ALEC meeting with taxpayer money.

National Institute on Money in State Politics‘ data demonstrates thatย Blackwell’s largest pool of campaign funding for his 2012 electoral victory came from the oil and gas industry, which gave him $28,800. This includes taking $7,500 from shale gas industry giant Chesapeake Energy,ย $2,350 from ConocoPhillips, and $1,000 each from Koch Industries and coal industry giant Duke Energy, among others. All of these corporations also fund ALEC.

Colorado’s Same Dayย Affair

One sure sign of a coordinated, ALEC-lead effort is the fact that Colorado’s state legislature introduced the ALEC model on the same day as did Oklahoma’s. The two states, it’s worth noting, share a border on Oklahoma’sย panhandle.ย 

On Jan. 18, 2013, eight representatives and four senators introduced HB 13-1089, coining the bills the โ€œAcademic Freedom Acts.โ€

Paralleling the language in the ALEC model and the Oklahoma bill, the HB 13-1089 aims to โ€œInform students about scientific evidence and to help students develop critical thinking skills,โ€ also recognizing that the teaching of the concept global warming โ€œcan causeย controversy.โ€

One of the senators co-sponsoring the bill, Rep. Scott Renfroe (R-13) is an ALEC dues-paying member. He’s also attended at least one ALEC meeting paid for by Colorado taxpayers, according to the CMD‘s โ€œBuying Influenceโ€ report.ย 

Of the $91,000 dollars he raised for the 2012 election, over $5,000 of it came from the oil, gas and electric utilities industry, according to theย National Institute on Money in State Politics. This includes taking money from Chesapeake Energy, Anadarko Petroleum, Williams Companies, and the Colorado Oil and Gasย Association.

The Arizona (Sun) Devils are in theย Detailsย 

Eight days later, ALEC‘s model bill made its way to Arizona, a state sharing a โ€œcorner borderโ€ withย Colorado.ย 

Arizona’sย SB 1213 was introduced on Jan. 26, 2013ย by six senators that, as it turns out, are all dues-paying ALEC members. Five of the six have attended conferences totally on the taxpayer dime, according to CMD‘s report.

SB 1213 incorporates the โ€œcritical thinking skillsโ€ operative language, the โ€œscientific controversiesโ€ operative language and the ย โ€œteachingโ€ฆglobal warmingโ€ can โ€œcause controversyโ€ย operativeย language.

In short, SB 1213 is the same exact copycat ALEC model bill that’s been proposed in both Oklahoma andย Colorado.ย ย 

ALEC Celebrates Groundhog Dayย 2013

Groundhog Day is on Feb. 2 and fittingly, ALEC and its corporate patrons continue to sing the same tune, simultaneously promoting fracking,ย blockading a transition to renewable energy and pushing bills mandating teaching climate change denialย on par with actualย science.

โ€œIt’s the same old schtick every year, the guy comes out with a big old stick, raps on the door,โ€ actor Bill Murray said in the classic film โ€œGroundhog Day.โ€ โ€œThey pull the little rat out, they talk to him, the rat talks back, then they tell us what’s gonnaย happen.โ€

Replace โ€œguyโ€ with โ€œcorporate lobbyistโ€ and โ€œlegislatorsโ€ with โ€œratsโ€ and that’s ALEC in a nutshell, serving as a mere microcosm of the current American political systemย at-large.

Photo Credit: ShutterStock |ย Yoryย Frenklakh

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Steve Horn is the owner of the consultancy Horn Communications & Research Services, which provides public relations, content writing, and investigative research work products to a wide range of nonprofit and for-profit clients across the world. He is an investigative reporter on the climate beat for over a decade and former Research Fellow for DeSmog.

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