HOW REPUBLICANS ARE ‘WEAPONIZING’ PUBLIC OFFICE AGAINST CLIMATE ACTION ~ NYT

Riley Moore stands in an office wearing a dark suit jacket unbuttoned with a white collared shirt without a tie. On the walls hang portraits of presidents and other officials. — Riley Moore, the West Virginia treasurer, announced last week that several major banks would be barred from government contracts with his state.Credit…Kristian Thacker for The New York Times

Gelles reviewed more than 10,000 pages of documents and emails while reporting for this article.

Aug. 5, 2022Updated 7:39 a.m. ET

Nearly two dozen Republican state treasurers around the country are working to thwart climate action on state and federal levels, fighting regulations that would make clear the economic risks posed by a warming world, lobbying against climate-minded nominees to key federal posts and using the tax dollars they control to punish companies that want to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Over the past year, treasurers in nearly half the United States have been coordinating tactics and talking points, meeting in private and cheering each other in public as part of a well-funded campaign to protect the fossil fuel companies that bolster their local economies.

Last week, Riley Moore, the treasurer of West Virginia, announced that several major banks — including Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan and Wells Fargo — would be barred from government contractswith his state because they are reducing their investments in coal, the dirtiest fossil fuel.

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