How Climate Protest Backlash Led to Present-Day Repression

How Climate Protest Backlash Led to Present-Day Repression

Author: Pushkin Industries February 3, 2026 Duration: 46:00

It's easy to feel like climate "doesn't matter" as the United States descends into fascism, as if climate and democracy are somehow separate issues. Researcher Oscar Berglund and Amy Westervelt connect the dots between the global backlash to climate protest and the broader repression we're seeing in supposedly democratic countries around the world.

 

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There’s a story behind the stalled progress on climate change that goes beyond melting ice and rising seas-it’s a story of deliberate deception. Drilled, from Pushkin Industries, approaches the climate crisis through the lens of investigative true crime. Led by veteran reporter Amy Westervelt and a team of award-winning climate journalists, this podcast meticulously traces how networks of corporate interests and political operatives constructed a decades-long campaign of denial and delay. Each season is a deep forensic examination, pulling on threads of new evidence to unravel systems of disinformation and hidden power. What you’ll hear isn’t just a recap of scientific reports, but a gripping narrative that follows the paper trail, the leaked memos, and the orchestrated efforts that have held meaningful action just out of reach. The result is a compelling and often unsettling listen that reframes our understanding of the past half-century. By treating climate inaction as a crime story, this podcast reveals the human architects and the calculated strategies that brought us here, making complex collusion startlingly clear. Tune in for a masterclass in accountability journalism.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 247

Drilled
Podcast Episodes
The First Day of School [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 37:33
Long before climate change appeared on the scene, fossil fuel companies were in America's classrooms, shaping young minds. Dharna Noor and Amy Westervelt explore how Big Oil got into the education game, why it worked so…
Drilled + Earther: The ABCs of Big Oil [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 3:26
Alongside Earther reporter Dharna Noor, this multi-part series will explore the fossil fuel industry's influence in schools—shaping our understanding of environmental problems and narrowing the scope of solutions to cons…
Whack-A-Mole [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 25:30
Frontline communities are facing a whack-a-mole problem: as one facility gets shut down, another pops up. In many ways, the plastic problem itself is a whack-a-mole issue catalyzed by progress in shifting away from fossi…
Keeping Oil Alive [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 17:38
Investigative journalism project UnEarthed, funded by Greenpeace in the United Kingdom, captured ExxonMobil execs talking through the company's climate playbook. We share an unpublished part of the report, in which a for…
And Then There Was COVID [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 21:49
Just as the fossil fuel industry was starting to worry about demand for single use plastics, along comes a global pandemic that they could leverage to push more of it. And they did! But was it enough to save them entirel…
Fighting Formosa in Louisiana [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 26:18
Diane Wilson couldn't keep Formosa Plastics out of her Texas town, but down the coast in St. James Parish, Louisiana, Sharon Lavigne is fighting like hell to keep the petrochemical giant out. See omnystudio.com/listener…
Don't Mess with Texas [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 24:58
How did the fracking boom lead to a plastics boom? We examine how the gas and plastics industries have embedded themselves in society through the story of one petrochemical company operating on the Gulf Coast and two wom…
Coming Soon: The Bridge to Nowhere [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 3:55
Season 6 explores the natural gas industry in three parts, following he story of Formosa Plastics to explain the direct connection between the fracking boom and plastics surge. Formosa Plastics is a company so notorious…
Update: Steven Donziger's Trial in New York [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 19:25
Steven Donziger went to trial for the criminal contempt charge that's kept him on house arrest for 600 days and counting. Paul Paz Y Mino of Amazon Watch brings us an update. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy infor…
How Big Oil Made You Feel Guilty About Climate Change [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 18:47
Harvard science historian Naomi Oreskes reveals how the fossil fuel companies use language targeted specifically to downplay the reality of climate change and shift responsibility entirely onto consumers. Geoffrey Supran…