Climate Justice Alliance (CJA)

CJA is a pro-Palestinian organization and has expressed its support for the anti-police movement. ^{4 5} In 2024, CJA was the center of controversy surrounding a $50 million federal Environmental Protection Agency grant that it was first awarded and subsequently rescinded because of its support for Palestine and Hamas. ^{6 7}

Background

The Climate Justice Alliance was formed in 2013 by advocates of the climate goals established in the 1991 Principles of Environmental Justice and the 1996 Jemez Principles of Democratic Organizing. The organization adopted its current name in 2012 after a climate conference in Detroit, Michigan. In 2013, the Black Mesa Water Coalition (BMWC) hosted the first national CJA gathering on Navajo Nation lands. Later that year, CJA expanded its reach into the labor movement when it penned an open letter to the AFL-CIO to join the climate movement to the left-wing labor movement. Since then, the Climate Justice Alliances has expanded its efforts through youth engagement efforts in climate activism, organizing climate marches, and other climate-based initiatives. ⁸

CJA’s membership is divided by geographic regions across the U.S. and globally. Members are primarily climate change advocacy groups like the California Environmental Justice Coalition or environmental activist subsidiaries of larger groups, such as the NAACP Environmental and Climate Justice Program. ⁹

Initiatives

The Climate Justice Alliance maintains several initiatives and projects. Its flagship initiative is the Just Transition Project, a revolutionary infrastructure and energy shift plan that CJA implements in various locales and advocates for on a national scale. The Just Transition seeks to replace the American economy in its current form with a culture and economy based on weather-dependent energy, socialism, and grassroots mobilization. CJA opposes what it considers the colonial and consumerist nature of the United States. Instead, CJA argues for divestment from capitalist businesses, politicians, and elites that support natural resource-based energy, and investment in local weather-dependent energy climate revolutions that do not rely on natural resources. ^{10 11} CJA calls this process of climate change reform the Just Recovery, through which it helps specific domestic and international locales transition to greener energies. ^{12 13}

CJA also has a Food Sovereignty Initiative to increase access for all people to healthy and culturally diverse food. Food Sovereignty is a central part of the Just Transition initiative, as are the It Takes Roots initiative, the Our Power Communities project, and the Reinvest in Our Power campaign, each of which advances a local and racially diverse platform for environmental activism. ^{14 15 16 17} CJA also has a project called the United Network for Impact, Transformation, and Equity in Environmental Justice Communities (UNITE-EJ) which combines the left-of-center, race-based equity movement with environmentalism. ¹⁸

CJA advances each of its projects and initiatives through policy advocacy, organizing marches and protests, and coordinating grantmaking to expand its financial network across its network of left-of-center climate organizations. ¹⁹

Political Influence

Policy Support and Opposition

The Climate Justice Alliance has expressed its support for several explicit environmental policies, including the Green New Deal and the greater Green New Deal Network. In April 2021, CJA sent representatives to meet with United States Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), U.S. Senator Edward Markey (D-MA), and other legislative proponents of the left-wing policy. ²⁰

CJA opposed the Biden administration-backed Inflation Reduction Act, which it said promoted several false solutions to climate change, including carbon trading, easy access to building permits, carbon capture, nuclear energy, and other geoengineering technologies. It opposed these measures because they promote what CJA considers to be the unjust foundations of the American economy and its infrastructure. ³

In 2024, CJA opposed the Energy Permitting Reform Act of 2024 (EPRA) proposed by then-U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin (I-WV) and Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY)  because it claimed the bill would make it easier for oil and gas companies to gain approval for environmentally damaging projects. ²¹ CJA celebrated the defeat of the bill. ²²

CJA also opposed 2025 appropriations proposals for several federal agencies, including the  Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Subcommittee Appropriations Bill for environmental impact concerns, most notably the committee’s mandated leasing to oil and gas companies. ²³

Israel-Hamas War

Within a month of the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack against Israel, the Climate Justice Alliance (CJA) issued a statement demanding a ceasefire while advocating its support for Palestinians in Gaza. CJA supported a ceasefire and considered Israel’s defensive counterattacks against Hamas terrorists in Gaza to be an act of genocide against Palestinians. CJA also called on the Biden administration to divest taxpayer funds from Israel in the wake of the war. ⁷ CJA claimed the liberation of Palestine from what it considers Israeli colonialism is inextricably linked to the environmentalist movement. ⁴

As of February 2025, the CJA website titled “Free Palestine is a climate justice issue” where it claims that “The path to climate justice travels through a free Palestine.” ²⁴ The subsection contains artwork advocating for “Palestine solidarity,” resources and online toolkits used to plan and organize pro-Palestinian protests, and social media highlights of a November 2023 protest it organized in Washington D.C where it called for a ceasefire while advocating for climate justice while claiming it would “stand in solidarity with Palestinian people on the frontlines of genocidal warfare.” ²⁴ Other member organizations involved with the November protest included Acta Non Verba, Asian Pacific Environmental Coalition, Communities for a Better Environment, Grassroots International, Grassroots Global Justice Alliance, GreenRoots, EarthCare New Mexico, Micronesia Climate Change Alliance, Organización Boricuá, Peoples Justice Council, Rich City Rides, Urban Tilth, and YUCCA.²⁴

Other Political Stances

During the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests, Climate Justice Alliance (CJA) expressed its support for the “defund the police” movement. ²⁵

In 2024, following the second presidential election of former Donald Trump, CJA issued a press release condemning the election. CJA claimed that President Trump’s election to a second term “is a loss for democracy and the rights of everyday people who want to live free from financial insecurity, pollution, discrimination, violence, and intimidation.” The organization claimed President Trump’s passion for oil and gas will further destroy the environment. ²⁶

Controversy

EPA Grant Controversy

In 2023, the Biden administration Environmental Protection Agency selected the Climate Justice Alliance as a recipient of a $50 million grant which sparked Congressional objections. CJA’s support for Palestinian nationalism and the anti-police movement led right-of-center media outlets and U.S. Senators to call for the EPA to revoke the grant, which it eventually did. CJA denounced this action and issued a press release demanding the EPA honor the grant and distribute the $50 million. ^{27 5 6 28}

Allegations of Extremism

In December 2023, CJA organized a protest in opposition to the construction of a law enforcement training facility in Weelaunee Forest in Atlanta, Georgia. That same month, Seth Brock Spigner of Charleston, South Carolina was charged with arson in Summerville, South Carolina for allegedly burning several trucks belonging to Thomas Concrete, one of the companies involved in the excavation and construction in the Weelaunee Forest. Spigner allegedly spray-painted messages on the trucks that appeared to reference CJA’s protest in the Weelaunee Forest. In response to the arson, the local law enforcement agency in Dorchester County, South Carolina labeled CJA an “extremist group,” an allegation CJA firmly rejected. It remains unclear if Spigner was officially affiliated with CJA or acting alone. ²⁹

Leadership

KD Chavez is the executive director of the Climate Justice Alliance. Prior to joining CJA, Chavez worked for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) where she was a member of the national Indigenous Justice Steering Committee which worked to advance left-of-center legal reform for Indigenous peoples. Chavez sits on the board of directors of Mountain Time Arts. Prior to the ACLU, Chavez worked in other left-wing nonprofit and activism sectors including a decade in abortion and LGBT advocacy. ³⁰ She holds a bachelor’s degree in political science and government from Florida State University and a post-graduate certificate in leadership from the Harvard Kennedy School. ³¹

Elizabeth Yeampierre is co-chair of the board of directors at the Climate Justice Alliance. Yeampierre is the executive director of UPROSE, Brooklyn’s oldest, left-of-center Latino community-based organization. Prior to assuming the executive director position at UPROSE, Yeampierre was the director of legal education and training at the Puerto Rican Legal Defense Fund, director of legal services for the American Indian Law Alliance, and dean of Puerto Rican student affairs at Yale University. She holds a bachelor’s degree from Fordham University and a law degree from Northeastern University. Yeampierre is also chair of the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) National Environmental Justice Advisory Council. ³⁰

Mateo Nube is co-chair of the board of directors at CJA. Nube has worked in other labor and environmental left-wing advocacy movements. He is one of the co-founders of the Movement Generation Justice and Ecology Project. Prior to co-founding Movement Generation, Nube designed and facilitated political education training and conducted staff development workshops for left-of-center grassroots and community organizations. ³⁰

Finances

In 2023, Climate Justice Alliance reported $9,580,362 in revenue, $9,256,399 in expenses, and $19,830,160 in total assets. ³²