Our vision of a future is one where the Federal Climate Amendment is the law of the land.

Our Vision

FCAI in the Press

FCAI’s Executive Director was honored on the 2025 Grist Climate Fixers, a list of 50 leaders innovating the future of the climate movement.

Since the start of President Donald Trump’s second term, Liao has turned his mind to the question of how to accomplish climate policy that can weather shifting political winds and stand the test of time. A thought kept flashing through his head: What if it was unconstitutional to stop climate progress? And what if it was constitutionally required to legislate for a safe climate? “We need to have a long-haul framework,” he said. “We’re going to keep losing progress until we have legally protected climate action.”

Every year, the Grist 50 list features the stories of 50 people who are doing vital, often unsung, work to build resilient ecosystems, protect and uplift communities, and ensure a liveable future. Despite the hurdles, when our team interviewed the leaders featured on this year’s list, every one of them said they’re committed to continuing their work for a better world. Some of them even talked about being galvanized by shifting political winds.

Take Lake Liao, for example — a college student who was first inspired to get involved in the climate movement when he was just 13, and stumbled across a video about the Green New Deal. After last year’s election, Liao began wondering what it would look like to build a sturdier foundation for climate policy that wouldn’t vary from administration to administration — by baking environmental protections into the law of the land.

Today, he’s focused on writing and advancing constitutional amendments that guarantee young people the right to a stable climate system. With the organization he started, Capitol Hill Academy, he and his collaborators are pushing for state-level amendments across the county and even an amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which would protect “the inherent, inalienable, and fundamental rights of all persons, including children and our posterity, to a healthy environment, clean air, pure water, and a stable climate system.”

A group of young people descended on the Capitol on Wednesday in hopes of convincing state lawmakers to support adding a “Green Amendment” to the Nebraska Constitution. Such an amendment — which would require approval by Nebraska voters — would give citizens a legal right to a “clean and healthy environment,” including “pure water,” clean air and “healthy soils.”

“We are here to fight for the right of a livable environment,” said Sara Holler, a Washington, D.C.-based activist

“The future for our generation should not be up for debate,” added Lake Liao, the founder and executive director of that organization, who said the younger generation would have to live with the consequences of failing to protect the environment.

But detractors of the effort, including Gov. Jim Pillen, indicated that such an amendment could empower governmental entities to “destroy private property rights.”

“Ill-defined constitutional amendments are dangerous to Nebraskans,” said Laura Strimple, the governor’s spokeswoman.

She said lawsuits could conceivably force homeowners to abandon Kentucky bluegrass lawns as not “native flora and fauna,” as outlined in the amendment. It also could restrict the amount of corn and soybeans planted in the state to provide a “balanced ecosystem.”

Liao rejected the idea that a Green Amendment would ever force a farmer to plant fewer crops or force a landowner to plant different grass.

The purpose, he said, is to protect the rights of citizens to a “healthy environment and clean climate when the government violates them.”

Holler and Liao were among speakers attending a rally and legislative hearing Wednesday over the proposed constitutional amendment.

2026 Youth Climate Rights Hill Briefing 2.0, a Congressional briefing

Our Impact

• 70+ Congressional interns, Congressional staffers, and youth climate organizers gathered at Rayburn House Office Building, Capitol Hill, Washington, DC

• Organized for H.Con.Res 44, the live Children’s Fundamental Right to Life and a Stable Climate System Congressional resolution led by lead sponsors Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky, co-leads Congressman Jamie Raskin and Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal, and Senator Jeff Merkley.

• Briefed Congress on the Federal Climate Amendment

• Hosted a panel with Katherine McIntosh, lead plaintiff in the McIntosh v. Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, a 2025 lawsuit against a gas-fired plant to power a 3200-acre AI data center based on the Pennsylvania Environment Rights Amendment.

2025 Youth Climate Rights Hill Briefing, a Congressional briefing

• FCAI with Congressional interns and our partner & Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky

Organized for 56 Congressional original co-sponsors on the Children’s Fundamental Rights to Life and a Stable Climate System resolution

2026 Congressional Education Campaign on the Federal Climate Amendment

• FCAI has met with 75 House offices and 20 Senate offices to educate members of Congress about the Federal Climate Amendment

With Congresswoman Adelita Grijalva

With Congresswoman Jan Shakowsky

Federal Climate Amendment Institute

A national youth-led movement organizing, educating, and researching to build the constitutional right to a livable climate through the Federal Climate Amendment, the next amendment to the United States Constitution.

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