How A Conspiracy-fueled Campaign Could Turn Republicans Against Weather Modification

A conservative group is preparing to sue climate startups that aim to reflect sunlight away from the Earth, in a new campaign that could turn Republicans against potential technologies to halt rising temperatures.

Launched in February, the group calling itself The GeoFight is tapping into deep suspicions among conspiracy theorists about efforts to modify the weather, including an experimental process to cool the planet known as solar geoengineering.

It's led by wellness-focused attorneys who dispute mainstream climate science and espouse unfounded assertions that airplanes are being used to spray communities with toxins. Their messaging, and fundraising appeals, are being directed at hundreds of thousands of followers on social media and podcasts.

The emergence of The GeoFight comes as a growing number of companies explore the concept of limiting sunlight amid faltering efforts to reduce the world's reliance on planet-warming fossil fuels.

It also reflects an unusual convergence of political groups on the right and left against technologies to limit warming — an issue that historically has alarmed some environmentalists because it might distract governments from efforts to reduce the use of oil, gas and coal. Both sides argue that the risks of geoengineering, which could include altering weather patterns and damaging the ozone layer, aren't worth the potential cooling benefits.

Conservative pundits like Tucker Carlson and former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) have recently spread misinformation about sunlight reflection technologies. George David Banks, who advised President Donald Trump on international energy policy during his first term and has remained in contact with the White House, expressed concern that the president could embrace the anti-geoengineering arguments of Carlson, Greene and The GeoFight.

"The president really likes conspiracies," said Banks, a supporter of solar geoengineering who is now the CEO of the American Council for Capital Formation, a free-market business advocacy group. "He likes these kinds of stories."

He added: "It comes down to social media influencers."

The White House did not respond to a request for comment.

The group is preparing two lawsuits against private companies, according to Nicole Pearson, one of three founders of The GeoFight. She declined to say which entities the group would target or what harms it plans to allege.

The GeoFight has created a petition that calls on states and the federal government to "take more meaningful action to prohibit solar geoengineering activities and, specifically, Stardust," a reference to a U.S.-Israeli startup named Stardust Solutions that’s developing a system for spraying millions of tons of sunlight-reflecting particles into the stratosphere.

In an interview, Pearson also referenced Rainmaker Technology, a prominent California-based firm that uses water-attracting particles to increase precipitation in certain types of clouds. The process, known as cloud seeding, has been used for decades and has bipartisan appeal in arid Western states.

"We have one lawsuit that hopefully will be filed within the next three weeks," Pearson told POLITICO in mid-July. "And then we have another class-action lawsuit that we are preparing now, which is taking a little bit more time."

When asked about the planned lawsuits, Stardust CEO Yanai Yedvab said his company was working to build public trust by sharing technical details about the reflective particles it's developed and how it intends to spray them above the clouds.

"There will always be conspiracy theorists," he added in an emailed statement.

John Seibels, a spokesperson for Rainmaker, said "we're not prepared to comment on nonexistent litigation."

From Covid to 'chemtrails'

Pearson, who lives in Orange County, California, said she began working with The GeoFight co-founder Thomas Renz, who is based in Ohio, about six years ago to oppose Covid-19 vaccine mandates and other pandemic-era restrictions. She said they teamed up with Chicago attorney Blake Horwitz, another co-founder, around a year ago.

Pearson and Renz both hold leadership roles in the Global Wellness Forum, an anti-vaccine group that was co-founded by Marla Maples, an ex-wife of Trump. Renz is the group's head of legal strategy and Pearson serves on its Stop Geoengineering Council. The forum and Maples didn't respond to requests for comment.

"The GeoFight and Global Wellness Forum and different entities," Renz said in an email. "The work of one does not necessarily imply endorsement from the other."

The GeoFight often conflates solar geoengineering, which primarily involves increasing the density of marine clouds or spraying sunlight-blocking aerosols into the stratosphere, with cloud seeding and so-called chemtrails.

Last year, Trump's EPA sought to debunk the chemtrails conspiracy theory.The agency said some people "inaccurately claim" that the long, thin clouds "resulting from routine air traffic are actually an intentional release of dangerous chemicals or biological agents at high altitudes for a variety of nefarious purposes, including population control, mind control, or attempts to geoengineer Earth or modify the weather.”

Such theories have been amplified by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and other adherents to the Make America Healthy Again wellness movement. Kennedy even sought to establish a chemtrails task force at HHS, according to reporting from Kaiser Health News. The department did not respond to a request for comment.

In February, Renz promoted legislation from Republican Rep. Greg Steube of Florida that would criminalize cloud seeding and solar geoengineering.

"It is happening on a profound scale," Renz said of chemtrails on his video podcast. He was speaking in front of a bookshelf that was stacked with lawbooks, a sword case and a Viking-style ax. "Much like the Epstein files, if we the people found out exactly how bad this is, we'd probably have a stroke."

"The Tom Renz Show" includes the tag line "putting an axe in the skull of tyranny" and features ads read by him for products like hormone support serums, peptide pills and bone-broth protein powder. It reaches over 42,000 followers on the conservative video streaming platform Rumble. Renz also has 362,000 followers on X.

Pearson has approximately 80,800 Instagram followers. Horwitz is far less active on social media.

'Every contribution helps'

Ramit Debnath, a professor of artificial intelligence and sustainability at the United Kingdom's University of Cambridge, said he has seen this type of conspiratorial trajectory on social media before. In a 2023 study, published in the journal iScience, he and his co-authors analyzed nearly 815,000 tweets over 13 years with the hashtag geoengineering and they found "conspiracies tend to spill over."

Promoting jaw-dropping ideas can attract new followers to online platforms that can be used by influencers to sell products or raise money, he explained in an interview.

"Irrespective of whether it's about geoengineering or anything else, it's more about spreading the network and spreading the attention economy," Debnath said. "You get a critical mass to listen to you, to support you."

The GeoFight is a nonprofit initiative that solicits donations from like-minded activists. "Every contribution helps make future litigation possible," the group said last month in an appeal to its over 9,000 Substack subscribers.

The law firms of Renz and Pearson have also encouraged supporters to help bankroll their legal efforts. Renz operates an online merchandise store, an "antiwoke" consulting firm, a ministry program and a cancer research charity, as well.

Pearson denied that she or her colleagues at The GeoFight are pursuing geoengineering litigation for financial reasons. "Our concern is truly protecting the health of our children and the health of the planet," she said. "We're not driven by money. Obviously it will help if we can win some money to fund experts … and pay for depositions and filings."

Renz said that he is not paid for his involvement in The GeoFight. "Money is not my motivation," he said in an email. "I care about the environment and health." When asked about the wellness-related products he promotes, he said it was necessary to fund his work.

"We accept donations, like any not-for-profit. No attorney has received a dollar up to this point,” added Horwitz, who disputed the characterization of The GeoFight as a conservative group. "It is simple to equate attorneys with grifters which is what you are trying to do and that’s unfortunate, discriminatory and disrespectful."

It’s not clear how much in financial damages The GeoFight would ask for in its potential lawsuits — or how much money could be wrung from the nascent geoengineering industry. Stardust, the most well-funded startup in the space, has raised a total of $75 million. By comparison, four AI startups have announced fundraising rounds of more than $1 billion in just the past month.

‘Open the door to others’

Pearson and Horwitz are currently representing atmospheric scientist Justin Mabie in a wrongful termination case that he brought in January against the University of Colorado, Boulder. The university and NOAA jointly operate the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences, where Mabie worked for more than a dozen years.

Mabie was fired in 2023, his lawsuit says, after he blew the whistle on the institute's efforts "to destroy essential documents found in the United States’ and United Nations’ historical weather record to generate a narrative that global warming and climate change are occurring at such a rapid rate that intervention in the Earth’s weather by the world’s governments and private actors — by way of geoengineering and weather modification — is necessary."

The wrongful termination suit, which The GeoFight joined in April, is seeking back pay as well as compensation for emotional distress and attorney fees. The university last month sought to have the case dismissed, arguing that Mabie can’t sue Colorado and that, even if he could, he had failed to file his case in time.

Mabie wrote a book about his experience working with federal researchers, "Climate Change Deception: The Alarming Corruption of Science," which was released in July by Skyhorse Publishing. Other Skyhorse authors include Kennedy, first lady Melania Trump, Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul and disgraced filmmaker Woody Allen.

Mabie and NOAA didn't respond to requests for comment. Nicole Cousins, a spokesperson for the university, said “we do not comment on personnel matters or ongoing litigation."

Renz characterized The GeoFight's litigation as part of its broader effort to oppose geoengineering.

"While the courtroom is not the place for policy discussions, it is my sincere hope that our work — particularly the public advocacy — will shape the conversation," Renz said. "At this point the people we oppose are proposing to pollute the air on a planetary level without proper study and without regard to human health impacts."

Banks, the former Trump adviser, believes that temperature increases will eventually prompt some countries to deploy sunlight-blocking technologies, which is why he has urged the administration to increase its support for geoengineering research.

The GeoFight and its followers could make that a tougher sell, he argued.

"These guys are first movers in a sense," Banks said. "If these guys are halfway successful, I think it's going to open the door to others" who want to profit from opposing geoengineering.