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During her Supreme Court confirmation hearing, Amy Coney Barrett depicted herself as an impartial legal arbiter whose personal views have no bearing on her court rulings. She made this argument most explicitly when she insisted: “I don’t think that my views on global warming or climate change are relevant to the job I would do as a judge.”

This facile line may seem convincing — Vox’s climate writer David Roberts echoed it, asserting that “ACB’s views on climate change really don’t matter” because what only really matters is her views of regulatory agencies’ legal authority.

That’s one helluva “well, actually” argument, but actually no: A past case tells a much different story. It illustrates exactly how justices’ personal views of climate science can determine what facts they accept — and do not accept — when they interpret the law.

Sure, Barrett spent the hearings touting her alleged objectivity, but her own answers about science illustrated deep and disqualifying bias.

What Happens When Another Massachusetts v. EPA Arrives at the High Court?

To understand how judges’ views about science can shape their rulings, consider the precedent-setting 2007 ruling Massachusetts v. EPA.

In that case, environmental groups backed by the state of Massachusetts asked the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to regulate automobiles’ greenhouse gases. George W. Bush’s EPA countered that it lacked authority “to regulate new vehicle emissions because carbon dioxide is not an ‘air pollutant,’” and it asserted that plaintiffs had no standing to even bring such climate cases in the first place.

The court’s ruling for Massachusetts was anchored in its acceptance of science. The majority ruled that yes, climate change has “resulted from a significant increase in the atmospheric concentration of greenhouse gases.” The majority then declared that the state has standing in court because “EPA’s steadfast refusal to regulate greenhouse gas emissions presents a risk of harm to Massachusetts.”

This angered Supreme Court chief justice John Roberts, who had advocated limiting environmental groups’ access to the courts since the 1980s. In the Massachusetts v. EPA case, he issued his own dissenting opinion that employed climate denial to try to argue that Massachusetts had no standing.

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