Prof who sought to 'ruin' National Review ordered to pay outlet over $500k in legal fees
A climate scientist and professor at the University of Pennsylvania has been ordered to pay the conservative National Review over $500,000 in legal fees after his lawsuit against the publication was dismissed.
On Jan. 10, the editors of National Review published a piece announcing the Washington D.C. court’s decision.
A climate scientist and professor at the University of Pennsylvania has been ordered to pay the conservative National Review over $500,000 in legal fees after his lawsuit against the publication was dismissed.
Michael Mann brought the lawsuit in 2012 in response to a blog post by National Review written by Mark Steyn that criticized Mann’s climate research. Mann sued the conservative outlet and Steyn for libel over the piece, as well as over an article by National Review Editor-in-Chief Rich Lowry titled “Get Lost.”
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While Mann did not win against National Review, the court ordered Steyn to pay $1 million in February 2024 for comparing Mann’s alleged manipulation of data to child molester Jerry Sandusky. The professor was ordered to pay $530,820.21 to National Review.
On Jan. 10, the editors of National Review published a piece announcing the Washington D.C. court’s decision.
“For more than eight years, the climate scientist Michael Mann harassed National Review through litigation over a blog post — until, eventually, the First Amendment brought an end to his attack,” the article reads. “This week, a court in our nation’s capital ordered Mann to pay us $530,820.21 worth of attorney’s fees and costs, and to do so within 30 days. It is time for him to get out his checkbook, and sign on the dotted line.”
“This restitution is welcome, if incomplete,” the piece continues. “As was made clear during the discovery process, Mann’s explicitly stated intention was to use a ‘major lawsuit’ as a vehicle with which to ‘ruin National Review.’ Happily, Mann failed in this endeavor.”
Mann, who was at Pennsylvania State University in 2012, has been a member of the University of Pennsylvania’s Department of Earth and Environmental Science since fall 2022.
In the July 2012 piece, Steyn contrasted Penn State’s failure to report former football coach Jerry Sandusky, later convicted of child molestation, to its investigation of Mann for allegedly misusing climate data. The university had previously exonerated Mann of this accusation in 2010.
In the blog post, Steyn quoted Competitive Enterprise Institute’s Rand Simberg, who Mann also sued: “Mann could be said to be the Jerry Sandusky of climate science, except that instead of molesting children, he has molested and tortured data in the service of politicized science that could have dire economic consequences for the nation and planet.”
“Not sure I’d have extended that metaphor all the way into the locker-room showers with quite the zeal Mr Simberg does, but he has a point,” Steyn wrote.
In their recent response to Mann having to pay over $500,000 in court fees, National Review editors also say that the fact that Steyn and Simberg were ordered to pay damages is a miscarriage of justice.
“The legal system hasn’t covered itself in glory, either,” the editorial finds. “Our own justice was repeatedly delayed, and, when it arrived, it was via the back door rather than as part of a ringing endorsement of the right to free speech. And, disgracefully, both of our co-litigants, Mark Steyn and Rand Simberg, have been ordered to pay damages.”
Campus Reform contacted Michael Mann for comment. This article will be updated accordingly.
