Plus, Big Tech betrays its climate pledges to embrace ‘energy dominance’ ...
From the Editor's Desk
The new year opens with all eyes on Venezuela, as Donald Trump escalates the geopolitical mayhem he unleashed in 2025 by seizing control of the oil-rich nation.
With the U.S. now intercepting oil tankers linked to the Latin American nation, the next question is: Who gets to carve up the spoils of Trump’s latest oil conquest? The winners, most likely billionaires and MAGA-aligned tech titans, could shape global emissions, supercharge climate denial, and inject yet more political chaos into an already unstable world.
DeSmog’s Geoff Dembicki’s year-end investigation, “How MAGA Changed the World in 2025, and What Comes Next” predicted that trajectory. The piece mapped how the MAGA movement spent the first year of Trump’s second term pushing a “radical anti-democratic agenda that has already changed our world — and will continue shaping it for years to come.”
Central to that agenda is an aggressive campaign to normalize climate denial at the highest levels of government. As Geoff points out, Trump’s Energy Secretary, Chris Wright — a former fracking executive — made that clear in a February speech to the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship conference, where he derided 2050 net-zero targets as “a sinister goal.”
Geoff’s reporting goes further, exposing how the Trump administration has forged anti-climate alliances with Big Tech, undermined democratic institutions in Europe, and actively fueled political turmoil in Canada. Read Geoff’s report here.
As 2026 begins, Trump’s billionaire backers and Silicon Valley allies seem poised to reap enormous rewards from the Venezuelan gamble, if 2025 is any indication.
That’s why we spent much of the year tracking tech executives’ climate hypocrisy in our new “Tech vs. Climate” series. Time and again, companies that publicly claimed they would help solve the climate crisis instead used their wealth and influence to deepen the risk of catastrophic climate breakdown.
Take tech behemoth Amazon. DeSmog’s Rei Takver revealed that the retail giant quietly sponsored an AI energy summit featuring prominent climate deniers — despite years of branding itself as a global corporate climate leader.
Among the speakers was Jarrod Agen, head of Trump’s National Energy Dominance Council, who told attendees the administration wants to “optimize” and “grow” the coal sector, according to audio obtained by DeSmog. This, from a Trump ally who has dismissed renewable energy as something that “hasn’t proven that it can get off the ground” — even as renewables become the fastest-growing energy source on the planet.
Read Rei’s investigation here.
DeSmog aims to delve deeper into explaining Trump’s political madness in 2026 and looking for patterns no other environmental news outlets are seeing. Because of this focus, our readership dramatically expanded in 2025. It’s thanks to all of you that we had one of our best year-end fundraising campaigns ever.
A heartfelt thanks to everyone who contributed as we forge ahead into the new year doing what DeSmog does best: exposing the deniers and obstructionists who want to prevent the world from transitioning away from fossil fuels and fighting climate change
Have a story tip or feedback? Get in touch: [email protected]. Want to know what our UK team is up to? Sign up for our UK newsletter.
Thanks as always,
Brendan DeMelle
Executive Director
P.S. This reporting exists because of readers like you. Can you pitch in whatever amount you can to help keep us going?
Image: Wright, Trump and Burgum in the Oval Office. Credit: Credit: Official White House Photo by Joyce N. Boghosian
Amazon Sponsors AI Energy Summit Featuring Climate Deniers
— By Rei Takver (5 min. read) —
Speakers at the event previously said “there is no climate crisis” and there is “lively debate” on climate science.
How MAGA Changed the World in 2025,
and What Comes Next
— By Geoff Dembicki (8 min. read) —
Across the U.S., UK, Europe, and Canada, Donald Trump and his allies worked tirelessly to supercharge climate denial, boost fossil fuels, and foment political chaos.
Gulfstream LNG CEO Says Carbon
Offsets, Cleaner LNG Are ‘Bullshit’
—By Sharon Kelly (7 min. read) —
Emboldened by Trump’s LNG deregulation, industry CEOs brush off climate concerns as Gulf Coast residents warn new gas projects will further strain an already environmentally stressed region.
Media Pushing Pro-LNG Report
Didn’t Mention Author Worked
for Oil and Gas Lobby Firm
— Taylor Noakes ( 4 min. read) —
Report author Mark Cameron is at Bluesky Strategy Group, which boasts to clients “our team has the reach to get your story told” in Canadian media.
Group Linked to Hungary’s Orban Co-organises Young Republican Gala
— By Clare Carlile and Joey Grostern (7 min. read) —
Far-right politicians from France, Germany, and other European nations and their U.S. allies celebrated their growing bonds and shared goals at a lavish party in New York City.
From the Climate Disinformation Database: Stand Together
Stand Together is the new branding of the billionaire industrialist Koch brothers’ Seminar Network, a nonprofit created in 2016 that describes itself as “community groups addressing maladies like poverty, addiction, recidivism, gang violence and homelessness.” However, its key objectives as part of the Seminar Network still include withdrawing from the Paris Climate Agreement and repealing the EPA Clean Water rules. Stand Together does not appear to have released any official statements on climate change, although Charles and David Koch have made statements about climate change and have funded groups to obstruct efforts to try to mitigate the climate changes that are underway. The Seminar Network received substantial backing from Koch Industries: “The board of Koch Industries continues to vote to provide substantial financial support to the Seminar Network. Koch Industries also has a number of officers, executives, and employees who spend significant amounts of their time working with the various Network organizations to help them be more effective.”
Read the full profile and browse other individuals and organizations in our Climate Disinformation Database, Ad & PR Database, and Koch Network Database.
