Men's Lifestyle April 7, 2026 0 Comments

Leonard Leo’s Secret War: How Deep Pockets and Shadowy Tactics Are Shaping Our Future—And What You Need to Know Now

You ever wonder how the same guy who helped pack the Supreme Court with conservatives is now hustling behind the scenes to shield oil and gas giants from the very lawsuits trying to hold them accountable for climate chaos? That’s Leonard Leo for you — a mastermind with a $1.6 billion playbook, weaving dark money through a web of nonprofits and lobbyists like some high-stakes chess game. It’s not just about courts anymore; it’s about state legislatures turning into fortresses that protect polluters, even as droughts scorch places like Boulder and wildfires rage like there’s no tomorrow. Makes you ask: In a world literally melting, how did we get to a point where stopping corporate damage is less important than dodging “woke” culture? Trust me, this isn’t your usual fight—it’s political muscle, billion-dollar bankrolls, and a battle for the future all rolled into one… and it’s far from over. LEARN MORE

4 min read

Remember Leonard Leo, the brains behind the carefully constructed conservative majority on the Supreme Court? According to the good people at ProPublica, he’s been a busy little lavishly financed bee hard at work wrecking other parts of the country on behalf of the oil and gas industry.

Across the country, Republican-led state legislatures are passing a slate of laws that effectively shield oil and gas companies from legal claims that they are responsible for the destruction and mounting toll caused by climate change. Fifteen laws have either been passed or are currently being debated in 11 states. Together, they threaten to remove long-standing tools for the public to hold corporations accountable.

A ProPublica investigation has found that most of these bills are part of a coordinated effort, orchestrated by a constellation of groups that share staff or have funding ties to the prominent conservative activist Leonard Leo, who is credited with placing conservative justices on the U.S. Supreme Court. These groups have drafted state legislation, planned its dissemination and engaged a well-connected lobbying firm to get them signed into law.

The effort, as ProPublica explains it, is a response by the energy oligarchs to state lawsuits demanding that they pay for the damage done by the climate crisis and by the industries that buried what they knew about it in order to make a buck. The American corporations having the social conscience of the average Gaboon viper, they need a sugar daddy like Leonard Leo to dodge responsibility for the damage they do.

The strategy to establish state laws that will make it all but impossible to sue oil and gas companies was laid out in detail by a group of lobbyists and political operatives in December, during a panel presentation at the annual States and Nation Policy Summit of the American Legislative Exchange Council—the influential organization that brings together state lawmakers, corporate leaders and conservative activists to draft and promote legislation.

Ah, ALEC, the legendary legislative chop shop. It has been a vital part of the wing-nut welfare community’s political power. Leo simply has brought boatloads of dark money into that power.

Since 2021, Leo has been deploying a $1.6 billion gift through a series of nonprofits and other organizations that obscure the source and the recipients of donations—so-called dark money groups. Much of that money has been routed through a nonprofit judicial advocacy group Leo founded—now called The 85 Fund—which both receives and disseminates Leo’s funding. Many of these nonprofits are increasingly focused on issues related to climate change. The panel session’s moderator, Michael Thompson, is a senior vice president at CRC Advisors, Leo’s for-profit Virginia-based political and corporate consulting firm. He also sits on ALEC’s Private Enterprise Advisory Council. [Will] Hild’s organization, Consumers’ Research, received more than 65 percent of its funding in 2024 through a dark money group called Donors Trust. The 85 Fund contributed more than $67 million to Donors Trust in 2024. Consumers’ Research also works closely with—and contracted more than $670,000 of work in 2024 to—CRC Advisors. Another panelist, Paul N. Watkins, was a legal fellow at Consumers’ Research. According to tax filings, his law firm received more than $2.2 million in 2024 from the group. As recently as 2024, [former Arizona solicitor general Oramel H.] Skinner was also counsel for Leo’s 85 Fund, according to the nonprofit’s tax filings.

“For decades, the left has leveraged immense resources to capture the institutions that shape our society—the legal system, universities, medical and scientific bodies, the entertainment industry, and our biggest corporations,” Leo wrote to ProPublica in a text message. “That takeover resulted in a radically woke culture that does not reflect the will of the American people, or the pillars of limited constitutional government that made our country great. That is why our enterprise supports organizations that are committed to crushing liberal dominance and restoring balance in the institutions that shape society.”

The poor American corporate class, pushed to the very brink by Drag Queen Story Hours, heavy metal, and the Modern Language Association. Leo lives in the same fantasy world in which some guy in Montana wearing camo lives. But Leo’s fantasy world is an aggressive, conquering force with all the money it needs to crush its (largely imaginary) enemies. Like, say, Boulder, Colorado.

Boulder, Colorado, is among the places facing increasing droughts, more extreme precipitation, and larger wildfires—all of which are significantly propelled by climate change linked to the emissions from the use of fossil fuels. The state has estimated the costs of these perils will run into the many hundreds of millions of dollars. In 2018, Boulder County sued Exxon Mobil and the Canadian oil company Suncor Energy, accusing the companies of “intentional, reckless and negligent conduct.”

Among its claims, the county alleged the oil companies engaged in a conspiracy to mislead the public and violated consumer protection rules by mischaracterizing the dangers of their products. They accused the oil companies of creating a public nuisance by altering the environment and leaving the county to pay to abate growing hazards such as the flooding that tests roads and bridges. Exxon Mobil and Suncor Energy have never filed a response in Colorado but asked for the case to be dismissed.

So your town is floating away? Hey, at least it’s not “woke.” There’s that.