When Science is Bent by Political Interests

Greenhouse gas, many researchers immediately denounced a series of distortions in the interpretation of their work. The document, presented as a critical evaluation of the climatic impacts of the CO₂, called into question the severity of warming and the effectiveness of emissions reduction policies. Apparently rigorous, he was based on real scientific sources, but sometimes made them lie.

Among the most flagrant cases, the climatologist Zeke Hausfather saw his 2019 transformed study. The report used one of its graphics to say that climate models overestimate the levels of CO₂, while its work concluded that a surprisingly just warming prediction. For her part, the biologist Joy Ward said that her experiences on the effects of CO₂ on plants had been carried out under laboratory conditions, and did not reflect the overall impact of climate change on ecosystems.

The phenomenon is not isolated. Already in May 2025, a report entitled Make America Healthy Again, commissioned by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., quoted nonexistent studies and attributed to scientists conclusions that they had never formulated. These documents, although not published in reading committee journals, are now directing major decisions such as the abolition of funding for RNA vaccines, as the microbiologist Deborah Fuller points out on The Conversation.

What reveals the manipulation of scientific data on the methods used

The shift is not only due to a biased interpretation, but to a structured method. Outside context quotes, graphic figures out of their annex, or even modified terminologies give the illusion of a different consensus. The DEE report cites for example the oceanographer Josh Krissansen-Totton to affirm that the acidification of the oceans remains in a natural variability range. However, the latter specifies in Wired that his research focused on time scales of several billion years, unrelated to the rapid changes observed today.

Other errors accumulate, as when the authors of the report use data from Antarctica to minimize the cast iron of the Arctic Banquise, or when they say that forest fires in the United States have not increased since 2007. The data specialist Jennifer Marlon dismantled these affirmations by checking the figures of the National Interagency Fire and confirming the net increase in burnt increase.

Several researchers mentioned in the report said that the authors had diverted their work from their real conclusions. The climatologist Ben Santer, interviewed by AFP, worries about this strategy which seeks to deliberately blur the scientific benchmarks of the public. Other experts share this feeling, such as James Rae, who describes the report of the Ministry of Rhetorical Exercise oriented against scientific rigor.

Between shaken credibility and scientific resistances, a committed showdown

The reaction of the scientific world was not long in coming. Following the publication of the Ministry of Energy report, 85 researchers filed a counter-document of more than 400 pages during the public consultation phase. Their objective was clear: to demonstrate, study by study, the diversions and omissions which made it possible to achieve conclusions contrary to the available data. For these scientists, it is no longer just a question of debating interpretations, but of defending the very integrity of the scientific method.

This form of manipulation of scientific data evokes the techniques that the tobacco industry has deployed to sow doubt about the effects of smoking. The parallel becomes all the more disturbing when we observe that the authors of the Doe report, like John Christy or Judith Curry, regularly collaborate with climatosceptic think tanks such as the Heartland Institute.

In this context, the displayed intention of wanting to “restore the common scientific sense” becomes suspicious. Especially when the publication of these reports coincides with a political will to revoke theendanger findingLegal foundation of the regulation of polluting emissions in the United States since 2009. AP News notes that the documents of the Trump administration are based more on the DEE report than on the work of the IPCC, however carried out by hundreds of researchers around the world.

Faced with this dynamic, the scientific community remains mobilized, aware that each diverted data can have very real consequences. Behind the graphics and technical paragraphs, it is the place of science in public decisions that is questioned.