Issues

Over the years, I’ve taken action on and written about a wide range of issues, most of them directly related to the goal of preserving a livable planet for this and future generations. Below are some of the major causes I’m focused on.

The youth climate movement

I became a climate activist in college in the ’00s, and have been writing about the youth climate movement ever since. I wrote Movement Makers: How Young Activists Upended the Politics of Climate Change, the first book to comprehensively document more than 20 years of youth-led climate activism in the United States. I’ve also done reporting for Waging Nonviolence and other publications about a wide variety of student and youth-led campaigns, from the Fridays for Future climate strikes to fossil fuel divestment to the climate litigation movement. Read more here.

Climate justice

The negative impacts of the climate crisis are felt first and worst by people of color, low-income communities, and Indigenous nations. In my writings about the climate movement, I try to seek out voices from outside the mainstream and report on acts of resistance on the frontlines of fossil fuel extraction and pollution. Learn more here.

Forests

Carbon-rich ecosystems like forests are our best defense against climate change, and protecting the last intact forests while allowing damaged ones to regrow is of paramount importance. Accordingly, I’ve recently begun to focus much of my writing on threats to forests and grassroots movements to protect them, especially in the Pacific Northwest where I live. Read more.