As CLW readers are aware, Michael Bloomberg is placing activist lawyers — privately hired, with Bloomberg’s cash — in compliant AG offices to pursue Bloomberg’s “climate” agenda. Records show that this began with civil litigation targeting Trump administration reforms in mind. However, as NY OAG’s “application” to the Bloomberg group working out of New York University Law School made clear, the intention was also to investigate and pursue private parties.
As noted in a recent Wall Street Journal oped, both Bloomberg’s group and the activist AGs with which it is cozy have stopped boasting about their canoodling. Folks who just couldn’t stop boasting of their scheme suddenly thought better of that — indeed, the last such boast was a December 2017 press release in which three new AGs (OR, PA, and VA) bragged that they were participating, two of whom (PA, VA) now deny they actually did so! Virginia’s Mark Herring has been telling this to a Richmond judge for months.
We also know that New York’s OAG terminated its deal with the Bloomberg group, in the face of apparent ethics stumbles. What gives?
Clearly, both parties concluded it was not worth the legal, ethical and political risk to enter this unprecedented trade in law enforcement with political activists.
Of course, it is conceivable the AGs and Bloomberg’s group merely decided there was too much legal, ethical and political risk in just admitting to doing it. Possibly some journalist will find out which of these it is.