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_This article was originally published byTruthout on May 28, 2026. It is shared here under a __Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) license._ For more than a week, the nation of Bolivia has been in a state of full-on revolt. In response to neoliberal reforms by the recently elected right-wing government led by President Rodrigo Paz, unions have launched a general strike, peasants and Indigenous peoples have set up dozens of roadblocks throughout the country, and massive marches have been held in the capital, La Paz. These are just a few expressions of a much broader social discontent, which has brought the country to a halt and stoked mass resistance to the larger project of U.S-aligned, right-wing attacks on workers and social movements in Latin America. Joseph Bouchard, a social scientist and journalist currently in La Paz as a visiting fellow at the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés, explained the diverse character of the movement. “It’s sort of a grouping of different social movements and groups that I think represents the wide spectrum within the Bolivian left,” Bouchard told _Truthout._ “You have teachers unions and workers unions. You have mining unions. You have just regular people joining who are not necessarily part of any movement. You have an Indigenous federation who used to be part of an anti-dictatorship movement in the 1980s. You have [former president Evo Morales’s] people … And so you have really all these groups that together add up to sort of the largest representation of the Bolivian left, disaffected voters, organized groups, disorganized groups.” While the diversity of the movement also brings a wide range of demands, one of the most popular is for President Paz to resign, with some sectors of the movement arguing that the country should maintain a general strike indefinitely until Paz has been ousted. The level of outrage is especially profound considering that Paz has only been in office for six months. ## **How to Lose a Populace in 6 Months** In October 2025, Bolivia elected right-wing populist Rodrigo Paz, ending 20 years of government by the left-wing MAS (Movement to Socialism) party founded by former president Evo Morales. Paz, running on a campaign of “capitalism for all,” promised to address economic hardships plaguing the country. His campaign also benefited from the implosion of MAS, which was experiencing intense infighting from which it has not recovered. Despite appealing to the economic concerns of the Bolivian people and positioning himself as more of a centrist than the country’s established (and much more extreme) right, once elected Paz wasted no time in carrying out attacks on the country’s workers and poor. One of his first moves was to eliminate a tax on large fortunes. He has also proposed education policies that teachers have criticized as privatization-oriented measures. > Two policies in particular have incited the outrage now rocking the country: a land privatization law and Supreme Decree 5503, which eliminated state fuel subsidies. Two policies in particular have incited the outrage now rocking the country: Law 1720, a land privatization law which many see as a move to hand over Indigenous lands to agribusiness and other large-scale landowners, and Supreme Decree 5503, which eliminated state fuel subsidies, practically doubling the consumer cost of fuel overnight. Along with the rising fuel costs, Paz’s government has further angered Bolivians by importing low quality fuel, or “junk fuel,” as the people call it, which has reportedly damaged people’s vehicles, imposing repair costs many cannot afford. It did not take long for the outrage to spread. Bolivia had already seen significant protests in December 2025, just a month into Paz’s presidency, but these were halted due to negotiations between the government and the country’s largest union federation, Central Obrera Boliviana (COB). Despite these negotiations the Paz administration continued advancing neoliberal reforms, further fueling outrage and forcing COB and other unions, including teachers unions, to call strikes at the start of May. Around the same time, rural Indigenous communities embarked on a long march to the capital, while other peasant and Indigenous communities erected blockades across major roads. Despite its best efforts, the Bolivian government has not yet quashed the nationwide shutdown, though on May 26 the country’s Chamber of Deputies voted to repeal restrictions on the use of military force against protesters. Even before the vote, the state had deployed militarized forces against protesters. This repression has only further radicalized the movement, with some protesters using dynamite, rocks, and slingshots to defend themselves against the military, according to multiple sources on the ground who spoke with _Truthout_. Reports emerging on social media confirm this as well. **GET FEARLESS, AD-FREE, UNCOMPROMISING REAL NEWS IN YOUR INBOX** Sign up A history student at the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés who spoke with _Truthout_ described the repressive climate that the protesters are braving. “Especially police, they have been repressing the movement with chemical agents, rubber bullets, and so on,” she told _Truthout_. “[The military] tried to stop the blockades which have been in the roads, but 30 minutes after they left, the blockades were rebuilt with even more people.” The student, who is a member of the socialist youth group Combate Rojo, asked to remain anonymous due to the doxxing to which members of her organization have been subjected from the far right. She mentioned that arrests and violence have been common in the crackdown on protests. ## **A Challenge to the Regional Right and U.S. Imperialism** The protests in Bolivia are not merely a national issue. They have implications for a regional strategy in which the United States is relying on far-right allies in Latin America to advance U.S. interests. These interests are expressed clearly in Trump’s 2025 National Security Strategy, which names the Western Hemisphere as the administration’s top region of strategic interest. It states, “The goal is for our partner nations to build up their domestic economies, while an economically stronger and more sophisticated Western Hemisphere becomes an increasingly attractive market for American commerce and investment.” > The protests in Bolivia have implications for a regional strategy in which the United States is relying on far-right allies in Latin America to advance U.S. interests. Paz has closely aligned Bolivia with the United States, joining the recently formed Shield of the Americas, a military alliance composed mostly of right-wing governments with the stated mission of fighting cartels. On May 21, the alliance issued a joint statement condemning the protests in Bolivia, alleging that the protesters are being led by “criminals and drug traffickers.” Under the Trump administration, allegations of drug trafficking have been used to justify a wide range of interventionist and militaristic policies including the attack on Venezuela and kidnapping of President Nicolás Maduro, the establishment of a seemingly permanent military occupation along the U.S.-Mexico border, dozens of illegal and deadly strikes on boats in the Caribbean, and a growing military campaign in Ecuador that has resulted in the bombing of a civilian farm in a rural village. Bouchard argued that the U.S. response to the protests is a rejection of Latin American sovereignty. “You can vote for a government and then decide you’re unhappy with what they’re doing if you feel like they’re betraying their promises or not fulfilling what they voted for,” Bouchard said. “This is how democracy works. U.S. government and right-wing allies in Latin America are basically saying that no protests are ever legitimate; if you vote for a government you’re basically supposed to accept whatever they do after.” Several of the Latin American governments who signed the Shield of the Americas statement are likely observing the protests in Bolivia with concern that their own populations could draw inspiration from them. The same week that Bolivian trade unions launched their general strike, Argentina and Chile saw massive student-led demonstrations against attacks on public education. Both Argentine President Javier Milei and Chilean President José Antonio Kast have been pushing their own neoliberal reforms similar to those carried out by Paz. > They know that they can bring down governments … They’ve done it before many times. These tactics work and they can get concessions. Even in Brazil, which is currently governed by the left-wing government of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, university students and municipal teachers in São Paulo have been on strike and held combative marches against austerity pushed by the state’s far right governor. While the protests in Brazil, Argentina, and Chile have not reached anywhere near the level of widespread anger expressed in Bolivia, they demonstrate a regional trend in which workers, students, and broader communities are beginning to rise up against economic strain and far right movements. The history student who spoke with _Truthout_ said that there are many in the movement in Bolivia who understand that their uprising poses a challenge to far more than just Paz’s agenda. “[Protesters] mention Milei, they mention the genocide [in Gaza],” she said. “That internationalist connection to U.S. imperialism and Israel, it’s there. You just can’t hide it.” Bouchard said that the Bolivian people understand their country’s history, and this informs how radical the movement has become and how much more radical it can get. “They know that they can bring down governments,” Bouchard said. “They’ve done it before many times. These tactics work and they can get concessions. They know that the Paz government is quite weak, and if they use these tactics like they’ve done before they can win.” TRNN — Support Independent Journalism The Real News Network Independent · Nonprofit · Nonpartisan ## The journalism that _refuses_ to be bought. Funded by people like you. TRNN produces fearless, fact-based reporting on the stories that matter — the ones corporate media ignores, minimizes, or gets wrong. No paywalls. No advertisers. No billionaire owners. Just the truth, sustained by viewers like you. 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Please copy the HTML code in the textbox below, preserving the attribution and link to the article's original location, and only make minor cosmetic edits to the content on your site. # Workers, students, and indigenous movements shut down Bolivia in popular rebellion by Sam Carliner, The Real News Network May 29, 2026 <h1>Workers, students, and indigenous movements shut down Bolivia in popular rebellion</h1> by Sam Carliner, The Real News Network May 29, 2026 <div class="wp-block-media-text is-stacked-on-mobile" style="grid-template-columns:33% auto"> <figure class="wp-block-media-text__media"><img src="https://therealnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/truthout-logo.jpeg" alt="" class="wp-image-277549 size-full" /></figure> <div class="wp-block-media-text__content"> This article was originally published by <a href="https://truthout.org/articles/workers-students-and-indigenous-movements-shut-down-bolivia-in-popular-rebellion/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Truthout</a> on May 28, 2026. It is shared here under a <a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)</a> license. </div> </div> For more than a week, the nation of Bolivia has been in a state of full-on revolt. In response to neoliberal reforms by the recently elected right-wing government led by President Rodrigo Paz, unions have launched a general strike, peasants and Indigenous peoples have set up dozens of roadblocks throughout the country, and massive marches have been held in the capital, La Paz. These are just a few expressions of a <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2026/5/22/bolivia-in-crisis-social-unrest-demands-for-president-to-resign-escalate" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">much broader social discontent</a>, which has brought the country to a halt and stoked mass resistance to the larger project of U.S-aligned, right-wing attacks on workers and social movements in Latin America. Joseph Bouchard, a social scientist and journalist currently in La Paz as a visiting fellow at the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés, explained the diverse character of the movement. “It’s sort of a grouping of different social movements and groups that I think represents the wide spectrum within the Bolivian left,” Bouchard told Truthout. “You have teachers unions and workers unions. You have mining unions. You have just regular people joining who are not necessarily part of any movement. You have an Indigenous federation who used to be part of an anti-dictatorship movement in the 1980s. You have [former president Evo Morales’s] people … And so you have really all these groups that together add up to sort of the largest representation of the Bolivian left, disaffected voters, organized groups, disorganized groups.” While the diversity of the movement also brings a wide range of demands, one of the most popular is for President Paz to resign, with some sectors of the movement arguing that the country should maintain a general strike indefinitely until Paz has been ousted. The level of outrage is especially profound considering that Paz has only been in office for six months. <h2 id="h-how-to-lose-a-populace-in-6-months" class="wp-block-heading">How to Lose a Populace in 6 Months</h2> In October 2025, Bolivia elected right-wing populist Rodrigo Paz, ending 20 years of government by the left-wing MAS (Movement to Socialism) party founded by former president Evo Morales. Paz, running on a campaign of “capitalism for all,” promised to address economic hardships plaguing the country. His campaign also benefited from the <a href="https://www.leftvoice.org/we-are-preparing-for-a-scenario-of-greater-crisis-and-class-struggle-interview-with-a-revolutionary-socialist-in-bolivia/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">implosion of MAS</a>, which was experiencing intense infighting from which it has not recovered. Despite appealing to the economic concerns of the Bolivian people and positioning himself as more of a centrist than the country’s established (and much more extreme) right, once elected Paz wasted no time in <a href="https://www.leftvoice.org/bolivia-is-leading-the-way-in-a-continent-wide-fight-against-the-far-right/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">carrying out attacks</a> on the country’s workers and poor. One of his first moves was to eliminate a tax on large fortunes. He has also proposed education policies that teachers have criticized as privatization-oriented measures. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-right"> <blockquote> Two policies in particular have incited the outrage now rocking the country: a land privatization law and Supreme Decree 5503, which eliminated state fuel subsidies. </blockquote> </figure> Two policies in particular have incited the outrage now rocking the country: Law 1720, a land privatization law which many see as a move to hand over Indigenous lands to agribusiness and other large-scale landowners, and Supreme Decree 5503, which eliminated state fuel subsidies, practically doubling the consumer cost of fuel overnight. Along with the rising fuel costs, Paz’s government has further angered Bolivians by importing low quality fuel, or “junk fuel,” as the people call it, which has reportedly damaged people’s vehicles, imposing repair costs many cannot afford. It did not take long for the outrage to spread. Bolivia had already <a href="https://www.spglobal.com/energy/en/news-research/latest-news/refined-products/121925-bolivias-fuel-subsidy-elimination-sparks-major-protests" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">seen significant protests</a> in December 2025, just a month into Paz’s presidency, but these were halted due to negotiations between the government and the country’s largest union federation, Central Obrera Boliviana (COB). Despite these negotiations the Paz administration continued advancing neoliberal reforms, further fueling outrage and forcing COB and other unions, including teachers unions, to call strikes at the start of May. Around the same time, rural Indigenous communities embarked on a <a href="https://x.com/Ollie_Vargas_/status/2056144372643803289?s=20" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">long march to the capital</a>, while other peasant and Indigenous communities <a href="https://x.com/Ollie_Vargas_/status/2056402140642578485?s=20" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">erected blockades</a> across major roads. Despite its best efforts, the Bolivian government has not yet quashed the nationwide shutdown, though on May 26 the country’s Chamber of Deputies <a href="https://x.com/DropSiteNews/status/2059445091534528870" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">voted to repeal restrictions</a> on the use of military force against protesters. Even before the vote, the state had deployed militarized forces against protesters. This repression has only further radicalized the movement, with some protesters using <a href="https://apnews.com/article/bolivia-protests-la-paz-dynamite-35532ee774130aa57cb8278a384852c3" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">dynamite</a>, rocks, and slingshots to defend themselves against the military, according to multiple sources on the ground who spoke with Truthout. Reports emerging on social media confirm this as well. A history student at the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés who spoke with Truthout described the repressive climate that the protesters are braving. “Especially police, they have been repressing the movement with chemical agents, rubber bullets, and so on,” she told Truthout. “[The military] tried to stop the blockades which have been in the roads, but 30 minutes after they left, the blockades were rebuilt with even more people.” The student, who is a member of the socialist youth group Combate Rojo, asked to remain anonymous due to the doxxing to which members of her organization have been subjected from the far right. She mentioned that arrests and violence have been common in the crackdown on protests. <h2 class="wp-block-heading">A Challenge to the Regional Right and U.S. Imperialism</h2> The protests in Bolivia are not merely a national issue. They have implications for a regional strategy in which the United States is relying on far-right allies in Latin America to advance U.S. interests. These interests are expressed clearly in Trump’s <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/2025-National-Security-Strategy.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">2025 National Security Strategy</a>, which names the Western Hemisphere as the administration’s top region of strategic interest. It states, “The goal is for our partner nations to build up their domestic economies, while an economically stronger and more sophisticated Western Hemisphere becomes an increasingly attractive market for American commerce and investment.” <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignright"> <blockquote> The protests in Bolivia have implications for a regional strategy in which the United States is relying on far-right allies in Latin America to advance U.S. interests. </blockquote> </figure> Paz has closely aligned Bolivia with the United States, joining the recently formed <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/mar/07/trump-shield-of-americas-summit" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Shield of the Americas</a>, a military alliance composed mostly of right-wing governments with the stated mission of fighting cartels. On May 21, the alliance issued <a href="https://bo.usembassy.gov/joint-statement-by-members-of-the-shield-of-the-americas/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">a joint statement</a> condemning the protests in Bolivia, alleging that the protesters are being led by “criminals and drug traffickers.” Under the Trump administration, allegations of drug trafficking have been used to justify a wide range of interventionist and militaristic policies including the <a href="https://truthout.org/articles/caracas-residents-describe-terror-of-us-invasion-as-they-worry-for-whats-next/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">attack on Venezuela</a> and kidnapping of President Nicolás Maduro, the establishment of a <a href="https://responsiblestatecraft.org/trump-border-military-assistance/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">seemingly permanent military occupation</a> along the U.S.-Mexico border, dozens of illegal and deadly strikes on boats in the Caribbean, and a <a href="https://theintercept.com/2026/03/23/trump-operation-total-extermination-ecuador-colombia-cuba/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">growing military campaign</a> in Ecuador that has resulted in the bombing of a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/24/world/americas/us-ecuador-drug-camp-bombing-dairy-farm.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">civilian farm</a> in a rural village. Bouchard argued that the U.S. response to the protests is a rejection of Latin American sovereignty. “You can vote for a government and then decide you’re unhappy with what they’re doing if you feel like they’re betraying their promises or not fulfilling what they voted for,” Bouchard said. “This is how democracy works. U.S. government and right-wing allies in Latin America are basically saying that no protests are ever legitimate; if you vote for a government you’re basically supposed to accept whatever they do after.” Several of the Latin American governments who signed the Shield of the Americas statement are likely observing the protests in Bolivia with concern that their own populations could draw inspiration from them. The same week that Bolivian trade unions launched their general strike, <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/americas/20250918-mass-protests-erupt-in-buenos-aires-over-milei-s-austerity-cuts-argentina" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Argentina</a> and <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/video/newsfeed/2026/3/26/police-fire-water-cannons-at-chile-student-protest" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Chile</a> saw massive student-led demonstrations against attacks on public education. Both <a href="https://www.dropsitenews.com/p/argentina-javier-milei-labor-reform-worker-rights-roll-back" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Argentine President Javier Milei</a> and <a href="https://www.npr.org/2026/03/11/nx-s1-5743653/chile-turns-right-kast-inaugurated-as-nations-most-conservative-leader-since-pinochet" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Chilean President José Antonio Kast</a> have been pushing their own neoliberal reforms similar to those carried out by Paz. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-right"> <blockquote> They know that they can bring down governments … They’ve done it before many times. These tactics work and they can get concessions. </blockquote> </figure> Even in Brazil, which is currently governed by the left-wing government of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, university students and municipal teachers <a href="https://x.com/saminthecan/status/2053873137402466410" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">in São Paulo</a> have been on strike and held combative marches against austerity pushed by the state’s far right governor. While the protests in Brazil, Argentina, and Chile have not reached anywhere near the level of widespread anger expressed in Bolivia, they demonstrate a regional trend in which workers, students, and broader communities are beginning to rise up against economic strain and far right movements. The history student who spoke with Truthout said that there are many in the movement in Bolivia who understand that their uprising poses a challenge to far more than just Paz’s agenda. “[Protesters] mention Milei, they mention the genocide [in Gaza],” she said. “That internationalist connection to U.S. imperialism and Israel, it’s there. You just can’t hide it.” Bouchard said that the Bolivian people understand their country’s history, and this informs how radical the movement has become and how much more radical it can get. “They know that they can bring down governments,” Bouchard said. “They’ve done it before many times. These tactics work and they can get concessions. They know that the Paz government is quite weak, and if they use these tactics like they’ve done before they can win.” This <a target="_blank" href="https://therealnews.com/workers-students-and-indigenous-movements-shut-down-bolivia-in-popular-rebellion">article</a> first appeared on <a target="_blank" href="https://therealnews.com">The Real News Network</a> and is republished here under a <a target="_blank" href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License</a>.<img src="https://i0.wp.com/therealnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/cropped-TRNN-2021-logomark-square.png?resize=150%2C150&ssl=1" style="width:1em;height:1em;margin-left:10px;"> <img id="republication-tracker-tool-source" src="https://therealnews.com/?republication-pixel=true&post=343805&ga4=G-7LYS8R7V51" style="width:1px;height:1px;"><script> PARSELY = { autotrack: false, onload: function() { PARSELY.beacon.trackPageView({ url: "https://therealnews.com/workers-students-and-indigenous-movements-shut-down-bolivia-in-popular-rebellion", urlref: window.location.href }); } } </script> <script id="parsely-cfg" src="//cdn.parsely.com/keys/therealnews.com/p.js"></script> Copy to Clipboard 1

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_This article was originally published byTruthout on Aug. 06, 2026. It is shared here under a __Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) license._ Can a lawsuit hold fossil fuel companies responsible for climate-change and its impact? That’s the question a Washington State-based woman is hoping to answer. Misti Leon is suing several big oil companies — including ExxonMobil, Chevron, BP, and others — over the 2021 heat-related death of her mother Juliana, who died during a record-breaking heat dome over the Pacific Northwest. For years, individuals and institutions have attempted to protect human lives from climate change using litigation. In 2015, a public interest law firm called Our Children’s Trust, representing nearly two dozen young people sued the federal government for failing to protect them against the impending impacts of fossil fuel emissions. Courts dragged their feet for more than a decade only for the case to reach a dead end at the United States Supreme Court in 2025. Leon’s civil suit is significant, not just because a Washington judge unexpectedly cleared the case for discovery and trial, but because Leon can directly link her mother’s death to climate change. Scientists concluded that the 2021 heat dome was, in the words of one research paper, “virtually impossible without human-caused climate change.” It’s about a crime that already occurred instead of hypothetical harm. “Ms. Leon’s case is unique in that it is the first of its kind to seek to hold big oil companies accountable for their role in an individual’s death in a climate-related disaster,” Mike Meno, communications director at the Center for Climate Integrity, a nonprofit advocacy group that supports community efforts to hold Big Oil accountable for climate change, explained in an interview. Juliana Leon was one of an estimated 1,200 people across the Pacific Northwest whose deaths were linked to the heat dome. “She was found unresponsive in her car,” said Meno. “The medical examiner determined that her death was caused by hyperthermia,” a condition that is the opposite of the more well-known cold-related condition of hypothermia. Hyperthermia-related deaths have sharply risen over the past decade, a predictable outcome of fossil fuel emissions. Oil companies such as Exxon have long been aware of the devastating impacts their product would have on the climate. “Major oil and gas companies decades ago knew, their own scientists told them internally, that if we kept burning fossil fuels, it would lead to, in the words of one internal Exxon document, potentially catastrophic events, just like the 2021 Pacific Northwest heat dome,” said Meno. > Juliana Leon was one of an estimated 1,200 people across the Pacific Northwest whose deaths were linked to the heat dome. Big Oil’s failure to act on this information has drawn comparisons to Big Tobacco. Companies like Philip Morris knew about the impacts of cigarette smoking on human health and kept it secret for years. Since that information was made public, individuals suffering from their addictive products have sued repeatedly and won. A major lawsuit brought by state attorneys general culminated in 1998 in what became known as the Master Settlement Agreement, where dozens of tobacco companies settled to the tune of billions of dollars for public health. Notably, the federal government also sued tobacco companies for violations of racketeering laws over their deception. **GET FEARLESS, AD-FREE, UNCOMPROMISING REAL NEWS IN YOUR INBOX** Sign up Yet while individuals and states are taking action in the case of oil companies, the federal government clearly has no interest in holding Big Oil accountable for climate change. Instead, President Donald Trump says he wants the Justice Department to investigate fossil fuel companies for _raising_ oil prices in the wake of the Iran war. This appears to be a classic case of deflection, given that a majority of voters blame Trump for price increases at the pump. He isn’t interested in holding companies accountable for climate change; he’s upset they made it harder for people to consume oil. Moreover, his administration is suing states for trying to enforce environmental regulations aimed at oil companies. In addition to keeping their own research secret, fossil fuel companies spent years sowing doubt over the cause-and-effect relationship between greenhouse gases and a warming climate. “What that decades-long deception campaign did is it stole a generation’s worth of time when action could’ve been taken, and we could’ve averted the worst of some of these climate disasters,” said Meno. This year, more extreme weather records are expected to be broken as climate change intensifies. The first half of 2026 was the third-warmest half-year on record. An El Niño phenomenon developing this year is expected to be one of the strongest in modern history. Whether or not the Trump administration admits that the climate is changing, Americans know it is. “Anyone of a certain age who can look back over enough time just knows, as a matter of common sense, that the climate we are all living in today is not what we had a few years ago,” said Meno. The industry knows it too — and, according to Meno, oil companies “are in absolute panic mode, fighting tooth and nail to escape accountability.” Leon’s lawsuit is hardly the only one they fear. Numerous states, counties, cities, and tribal governments are suing Big Oil, and making headway. Meno explained that companies have “been pleading with the U.S. Supreme Court to take up one of these cases for years.” The Supreme Court finally agreed to review a case in Colorado where that state’s supreme court in May 2025 ruled the City of Boulder and Boulder County could move forward with discovery and trial in their suit against ExxonMobil and Suncor. Not content with leaving it to the U.S. Supreme Court, Big Oil has been lobbying Congress to grant the industry immunity over its role in climate change — and conservative lawmakers have complied. In April, Wyoming Rep. Harriet Hageman and Texas Sen. Ted Cruz introduced the “Stop Climate Shakedowns Act of 2026.” If Congress were to pass the bill, according to Meno, it “would be a truly unprecedented legal shield that would strip the public of their right to hold these corporations accountable for the harm they’ve caused.” Meno’s Center for Climate Integrity is urging members of the public to demand their elected representatives vote against Hageman and Cruz’s bill. Big Oil says it deserves immunity because it shouldn’t be penalized for giving the public what it wants. In a joint statement, American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers President and CEO Chet Thompson and American Petroleum Institute President and CEO Mike Sommers said: “These efforts to retroactively penalize companies for lawfully meeting consumer demand are misguided and counterproductive.” What they didn’t say is that they have worked for years to prevent fair competition from renewables. It’s why the state of Michigan launched an antitrust lawsuit against ExxonMobil, BP, Chevron, and others because they acted “as a cartel … to forestall meaningful competition from renewable energy in order to maintain their dominance.” Fossil fuel companies have long known their products are deadly, kept it secret, unfairly ensured their dominance, then argued that they ought not to be sued for delivering a product the public wants. Now, as climate-related deaths stack up, the industry claims it isn’t responsible. Misti Leon, whose mother might be alive today if governments and courts had reined in Big Oil, told _The New York Times_: “I never would have in a million years guessed that a heat dome and climate change would be what killed my mother and what took her from me. There’s no way to comprehend that and to kind of even rationalize it.” TRNN — Support Independent Journalism The Real News Network Independent · Nonprofit · Nonpartisan ## The journalism that _refuses_ to be bought. 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We encourage republication of our original content. Please copy the HTML code in the textbox below, preserving the attribution and link to the article's original location, and only make minor cosmetic edits to the content on your site. # Juliana Leon died in a climate-linked heat wave. Her daughter is suing Big Oil. by Sonali Kolhatkar, The Real News Network August 7, 2026 <h1>Juliana Leon died in a climate-linked heat wave. Her daughter is suing Big Oil.</h1> by Sonali Kolhatkar, The Real News Network August 7, 2026 <div class="wp-block-media-text is-stacked-on-mobile" style="grid-template-columns:33% auto"> <figure class="wp-block-media-text__media"><img src="https://therealnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/truthout-logo.jpeg" alt="" class="wp-image-277549 size-full" /></figure> <div class="wp-block-media-text__content"> This article was originally published by <a href="https://truthout.org/articles/juliana-leon-died-in-a-climate-linked-heat-wave-her-daughter-is-suing-big-oil/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Truthout</a> on Aug. 06, 2026. It is shared here under a <a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)</a> license. </div> </div> Can a lawsuit hold fossil fuel companies responsible for climate-change and its impact? That’s the question a Washington State-based woman is hoping to answer. <a href="https://insideclimatenews.org/news/05062025/the-estate-of-a-woman-who-died-in-the-2021-pacific-northwest-heat-dome-sues-big-oil-for-wrongful-death/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Misti Leon</a> is suing several big oil companies — including ExxonMobil, Chevron, BP, and others — over the 2021 heat-related <a href="https://insideclimatenews.org/news/05062025/the-estate-of-a-woman-who-died-in-the-2021-pacific-northwest-heat-dome-sues-big-oil-for-wrongful-death/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">death</a> of her mother Juliana, who died during a <a href="https://www.climatehubs.usda.gov/hubs/northwest/topic/2021-northwest-heat-dome-causes-impacts-and-future-outlook" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">record-breaking heat dome</a> over the Pacific Northwest. For years, individuals and institutions have attempted to protect human lives from climate change using litigation. In 2015, a public interest law firm called Our Children’s Trust, representing nearly two dozen young people <a href="https://www.ourchildrenstrust.org/juliana-v-us" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">sued the federal government</a> for failing to protect them against the impending impacts of fossil fuel emissions. Courts dragged their feet for more than a decade only for the case to reach a dead end at the United States Supreme Court in 2025. Leon’s civil suit is significant, not just because a Washington judge unexpectedly <a href="https://climateintegrity.org/news/view/first-wrongful-death-climate-case-against-big-oil-wins-major-rulings-moves-toward-trial" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">cleared</a> the case for discovery and trial, but because Leon can directly link her mother’s death to climate change. Scientists <a href="https://www.worldweatherattribution.org/wp-content/uploads/NW-US-extreme-heat-2021-scientific-report-WWA.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">concluded</a> that the 2021 heat dome was, in the words of one research paper, “virtually impossible without human-caused climate change.” It’s about a crime that already occurred instead of hypothetical harm. “Ms. Leon’s case is unique in that it is the first of its kind to seek to hold big oil companies accountable for their role in an individual’s death in a climate-related disaster,” Mike Meno, communications director at the <a href="https://climateintegrity.org/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Center for Climate Integrity</a>, a nonprofit advocacy group that supports community efforts to hold Big Oil accountable for climate change, explained in an <a href="https://risingupwithsonali.com/climate-change-is-here-can-suing-big-oil-work/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">interview</a>. Juliana Leon was one of an estimated <a href="https://www.kuow.org/2026-06-29/five-years-after-the-dome-washington-is-still-vulnerable-to-extreme-heat" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">1,200 people</a> across the Pacific Northwest whose deaths were linked to the heat dome. “She was found unresponsive in her car,” said Meno. “The medical examiner determined that her death was caused by hyperthermia,” a condition that is the opposite of the more well-known cold-related condition of hypothermia. Hyperthermia-related deaths have <a href="https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2822854" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">sharply risen</a> over the past decade, a predictable outcome of fossil fuel emissions. Oil companies such as Exxon have long been <a href="https://www.climatefiles.com/exxon-knew/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">aware</a> of the devastating impacts their product would have on the climate. “Major oil and gas companies decades ago knew, their own scientists told them internally, that if we kept burning fossil fuels, it would lead to, in the words of one internal Exxon document, potentially catastrophic events, just like the 2021 Pacific Northwest heat dome,” said Meno. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignright"> <blockquote> Juliana Leon was one of an estimated 1,200 people across the Pacific Northwest whose deaths were linked to the heat dome. </blockquote> </figure> Big Oil’s failure to act on this information has drawn comparisons to Big Tobacco. Companies like Philip Morris knew about the impacts of cigarette smoking on human health and kept it secret for years. Since that information was made public, <a href="https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC1117897/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">individuals</a> suffering from their addictive products have sued repeatedly and won. A <a href="https://www.naag.org/our-work/naag-center-for-tobacco-and-public-health/the-master-settlement-agreement/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">major lawsuit</a> brought by state attorneys general culminated in 1998 in what became known as the Master Settlement Agreement, where dozens of tobacco companies settled to the tune of billions of dollars for public health. Notably, the federal government also sued tobacco companies for violations of <a href="https://www.fightcancer.org/what-we-do/big-tobacco-lawsuit" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">racketeering laws</a> over their deception. Yet while individuals and states are taking action in the case of oil companies, the federal government clearly has no interest in <a href="https://truthout.org/articles/republicans-are-trying-to-give-big-oil-immunity-for-causing-climate-chaos/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">holding Big Oil accountable</a> for climate change. Instead, President Donald Trump <a href="https://fortune.com/2026/06/25/trump-accuses-big-oil-of-price-gouging/">says</a> he wants the Justice Department to investigate fossil fuel companies for raising oil prices in the wake of the Iran war. This appears to be a classic case of deflection, given that a majority of voters <a href="https://www.wkow.com/news/national/most-voters-blame-trump-for-rising-gas-prices-quinnipiac-poll-shows/article_2d034979-abdd-4ec0-aa73-a374dbcba7be.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">blame Trump</a> for price increases at the pump. He isn’t interested in holding companies accountable for climate change; he’s upset they made it harder for people to consume oil. Moreover, his administration is <a href="https://truthout.org/articles/dojs-environmental-enforcement-arm-has-been-captured-by-industry-critics-say/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">suing states</a> for trying to enforce environmental regulations aimed at oil companies. In addition to keeping their own research secret, fossil fuel companies spent years sowing doubt over the cause-and-effect relationship between greenhouse gases and a warming climate. “What that decades-long deception campaign did is it stole a generation’s worth of time when action could’ve been taken, and we could’ve averted the worst of some of these climate disasters,” said Meno. This year, more extreme weather records are expected to be broken as climate change intensifies. The first half of 2026 was the <a href="https://www.carbonbrief.org/state-of-the-climate-rapidly-developing-el-nino-raises-chance-of-record-warm-2026" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">third-warmest</a> half-year on record. An <a href="https://prospect.org/2026/07/28/climate-change-wildfires-smoke-el-nino-renewable-energy-trump/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">El Niño phenomenon</a> developing this year is expected to be one of the strongest in modern history. Whether or not the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/09/climate/climate-change-deniers-trump.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Trump administration admits</a> that the climate is changing, Americans <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/708050/climate-change-concern-near-high-point.aspx" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">know</a> it is. “Anyone of a certain age who can look back over enough time just knows, as a matter of common sense, that the climate we are all living in today is not what we had a few years ago,” said Meno. The industry knows it too — and, according to Meno, oil companies “are in absolute panic mode, fighting tooth and nail to escape accountability.” Leon’s lawsuit is hardly the only one they fear. Numerous states, counties, cities, and tribal governments are <a href="https://climateintegrity.org/uploads/media/CCI-BigOilAccountabilityLawsuits.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">suing</a> Big Oil, and making headway. Meno explained that companies have “been pleading with the U.S. Supreme Court to take up one of these cases for years.” The Supreme Court finally <a href="https://bouldercolorado.gov/news/us-supreme-court-decides-hear-climate-case-against-exxon-and-suncor-entities" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">agreed</a> to review a case in Colorado where that state’s supreme court in May 2025 <a href="https://bouldercolorado.gov/news/colorado-supreme-court-advances-historic-boulder-climate-accountability-case" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">ruled</a> the City of Boulder and Boulder County could move forward with discovery and trial in their suit against ExxonMobil and Suncor. Not content with leaving it to the U.S. Supreme Court, Big Oil has been lobbying Congress to grant the industry immunity over its role in climate change — and <a href="https://truthout.org/articles/republicans-are-trying-to-give-big-oil-immunity-for-causing-climate-chaos/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">conservative lawmakers</a> have complied. In April, Wyoming Rep. Harriet Hageman and Texas Sen. Ted Cruz <a href="https://hageman.house.gov/media/press-releases/rep-hageman-introduces-bill-shield-american-energy-producers-leftist-climate" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">introduced</a> the “Stop Climate Shakedowns Act of 2026.” If Congress were to pass the bill, according to Meno, it “would be a truly unprecedented legal shield that would strip the public of their right to hold these corporations accountable for the harm they’ve caused.” Meno’s Center for Climate Integrity is <a href="https://www.noimmunityforbigoil.org/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">urging members of the public</a> to demand their elected representatives vote against Hageman and Cruz’s bill. Big Oil says it deserves immunity because it shouldn’t be penalized for giving the public what it wants. In a joint statement, American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers President and CEO Chet Thompson and American Petroleum Institute President and CEO Mike Sommers <a href="https://hageman.house.gov/media/press-releases/rep-hageman-introduces-bill-shield-american-energy-producers-leftist-climate" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">said</a>: “These efforts to retroactively penalize companies for lawfully meeting consumer demand are misguided and counterproductive.” What they didn’t say is that they have worked for years to <a href="https://influencemap.org/briefing/Undermining-Progress-Investigating-the-Fossil-Fuel-Sector-s-Continual-Dominance-26562" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">prevent fair competition</a> from renewables. It’s why the <a href="https://www.michigan.gov/ag/news/press-releases/2026/01/23/attorney-general-nessel-files-lawsuit-against-fossil-fuel-defendants" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">state of Michigan</a> launched an antitrust lawsuit against ExxonMobil, BP, Chevron, and others because they acted “as a cartel … to forestall meaningful competition from renewable energy in order to maintain their dominance.” Fossil fuel companies have long known their products are deadly, kept it secret, unfairly ensured their dominance, then argued that they ought not to be sued for delivering a product the public wants. Now, as climate-related deaths stack up, the industry claims it isn’t responsible. Misti Leon, whose mother might be alive today if governments and courts had reined in Big Oil, told <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/29/climate/oil-companies-wrongful-death-lawsuit-heat-dome.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">The New York Times</a>: “I never would have in a million years guessed that a heat dome and climate change would be what killed my mother and what took her from me. There’s no way to comprehend that and to kind of even rationalize it.” This <a target="_blank" href="https://therealnews.com/juliana-leon-died-in-a-climate-linked-heat-wave-her-daughter-is-suing-big-oil">article</a> first appeared on <a target="_blank" href="https://therealnews.com">The Real News Network</a> and is republished here under a <a target="_blank" href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License</a>.<img src="https://i0.wp.com/therealnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/cropped-TRNN-2021-logomark-square.png?resize=150%2C150&ssl=1" style="width:1em;height:1em;margin-left:10px;"> <img id="republication-tracker-tool-source" src="https://therealnews.com/?republication-pixel=true&post=345687&ga4=G-7LYS8R7V51" style="width:1px;height:1px;"><script> PARSELY = { autotrack: false, onload: function() { PARSELY.beacon.trackPageView({ url: "https://therealnews.com/juliana-leon-died-in-a-climate-linked-heat-wave-her-daughter-is-suing-big-oil", urlref: window.location.href }); } } </script> <script id="parsely-cfg" src="//cdn.parsely.com/keys/therealnews.com/p.js"></script> Copy to Clipboard

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