(San Francisco, January 6, 2025) – President Joe Biden should pardon peaceful climate activists facing disproportionate charges and prison sentences for actions aimed at drawing attention to the escalating climate crisis, Climate Rights International said in a letter to President Biden sent on January 3.

Joanna Smith and Timothy Martin engaged in symbolic acts of civil disobedience in Washington, D.C., to highlight the profound risks the climate crisis poses to people and the planet. Biden should pardon any other peaceful climate activists convicted and sentenced under U.S. federal law.

“The United States has a long history of peaceful protest, from the Suffragettes to the civil rights movement, to address urgent social and political issues,” said Brad Adams, Executive Director at Climate Rights International. “Climate activists today are acting in that tradition, yet have faced ridiculous charges of conspiracy against the United States and disproportionate prison sentences. President Biden should follow the logic of his own strong calls for climate action and pardon them.”

In September 2024, Climate Rights International published On Thin Ice: Disproportionate Responses to Climate Change Protesters in Democratic Countries, about crackdowns on peaceful climate protesters in the U.S. and other countries. The report described the cases of Joanna Smith and Timothy Martin, who were charged with the two felonies: conspiracy to commit an act against the United States, and injury to a National Gallery of Art exhibit. The charges followed their peaceful protest on April 27, 2023, in which they used washable finger paint on the protective case of Edgar Degas’ Little Dancer Aged Fourteen at the National Gallery of Art. Each charge has a sentence of up to five years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000.

As Joanna Smith told Climate Rights International:

“We went into the museum with washable nursery school fingerpaint and approached the Little Dancer in her protective box, which no other children in the world have.”

(You can see exactly what they did in this one-minute video.)

Smith received a 60-day prison sentence, along with financial penalties, a two-year ban from Washington, D.C., and all museums and monuments in the United States. Martin faces up to ten years in prison at his trial, which had been scheduled for January 6 but is now due to take place in March 2025.

President Biden has frequently called for strong action on climate. For example, on July 20, 2022, he issued this clarion call:

“And when it comes to fighting the climate change — climate change, I will not take no for an answer.  I will do everything in my power to clean our air and water, protect our people’s health, to win the clean energy future. This, again, sounds like hyperbole, but our children and grandchildren are counting on us.”

“These activists, who were trying to ‘do everything in their power’ to protect people’s health and ‘win the clean energy future,’ should not be facing felony convictions and lengthy prison sentences,” said Adams. “President Biden should affirm his commitment to tackling the climate crisis and respect for freedom of protest by pardoning them.”