David Sassoon writes:

In October 2014, Daniel Ellsberg opened the door to one of the most consequential climate stories of our time. I know because Inside Climate News was able to publish it a year later. We were both attending the same invitation-only journalism conference at the Cronkite School at Arizona State University when we met. On my flight to Phoenix, I had seen his name on the list of attendees, and hours later I found myself at the opening dinner, talking to him as we filled our plates with food at the buffet and found an empty table. There were a hundred journalists around us and I had him to myself for half an hour.

I was not out to get a story. I mostly wanted the honor of meeting him and to thank him for what he had done, which I did. He graciously nodded, but he didn’t want to talk about himself. He wanted to know about Inside Climate News. He had never heard of us. Without bragging I let him know right away that we had won a Pulitzer Prize. He was pleased to hear that. The recognition had allowed our remote non-profit newsroom to double in size – to twelve people. What were we working on now? I didn’t have a good answer. We were tiny and no match for oil industry misinformation, I said. He listened to my lamentations with a kind and gentle demeanor, like a favorite uncle or guardian angel.

Well then, he said, you should find out what the oil companies knew, and when they knew it. The look on my face asked how the hell are we going to do that, and he answered me. “You’ll find people of conscience in every corporation.” Like him at Rand. His words turned on a light inside my head, a sudden illumination. “We’re on it!” I said. He was pointing me to the most consequential climate story anyone could tell. “We’re on it,” I repeated. If our newsroom could locate the answers to the questions Ellsberg posed, the climate crisis would be on its way to being confronted. [Continue reading…]