Cardinal George Pell discussed a plan to set up a two-sided “debate” about human-caused climate change with the US Environmental Protection Agency chief, Scott Pruitt , at the Vatican in 2017, it has been revealed.

According to documents collated by The New York Times, Pruitt joined Pell and others for a $240-a-head dinner in June 2017, an engagement that was left off official schedules of Pruitt’s Vatican visit.

In an email sent during the dinner, one EPA staff member said Pell and Pruitt had discussed a Wall Street Journal article reporting on proposals for a military-style “red team/blue team” debate on climate science.

Climate science denial groups, including the Heartland Institute, have been pushing the idea of such a debate for years. The proposal from Pruitt for the debate appears to be on hold.

The New York Times reporter Eric Lipton, sharing documents on Twitter, commented that Pell’s name had been left off multiple versions of Pruitt’s EPA schedule for the Vatican trip, which included a private mass and special tours.



Pell, the Vatican’s treasurer, has dismissed the science linking greenhouse gas emissions with dangerous climate change.

Pruitt has also refused to acknowledge the science showing carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuel burning as a main driver of global warming.

Pell has previously given the annual lecture for the Global Warming Policy Foundation, a UK climate science denial group, in which he said adding CO2 to the atmosphere would be merely good news for plants.

His speech was described by climate scientists as “utter rubbish” and “flawed”.

One GWPF funder, Australian hedge fund billionaire Michael Hintze, has also donated millions for renovations at the Vatican and sits on the board of the Vatican Bank. Hintze has also been a major donor to the UK’s Conservative party.



Pell is a long-standing spiritual mentor to former Australian prime minister Tony Abbott, who delivered the GWPF’s 2017 annual lecture.

The cardinal has been on leave from the Vatican to return to Australia, where he is facing historical sexual offence charges, which he denies.

It was first revealed that Pell was under investigation in February 2016, but he was not formally charged until 29 June 2017 – almost three weeks after the dinner with Pruitt.

Also at the dinner was Leonard Leo, who heads the conservative judicial group the Federalist Society and who, according to an earlier report in the New York Times, had helped the EPA to organise the June 2017 Vatican trip.



The Federalist Society is a noted “pipeline” for supreme court appointments under the Trump administration.

A version of this story was originally published at DeSmog