The sky outside is hazy orange, and a five-year-old is screaming bloody murder because the beach trip got canceled. Not because of rain - because the air is literally unsafe to breathe. This month, record-breaking wildfires turned the Midwest and Northeast into an apocalyptic filter, while a lethal heatwave canceled Fourth of July festivities and caused “numerous mass casualty events.” According to scientists, these aren’t “natural” disasters. A study found that the July heatwave would have been “virtually impossible” without climate change, and other research - validated by the National Academy of Sciences - showed that pollution from ExxonMobil, Chevron, Shell, and BP made some heatwaves at least 10,000 times more likely.

Big oil knew this was coming. Decades ago, they predicted “globally catastrophic” climate harms, “more violent weather,” and “suffering and death due to thermal extremes.” They used that knowledge to protect their own infrastructure while funding fraudulent climate denial campaigns. So it’s no surprise that people are calling for Nuremberg-style trials for Big Oil. The Nazis killed about 40 million people; climate change could kill over a billion this century. But Aaron Regunberg, director of Public Citizen’s Climate Accountability Project, argues we don’t need new laws - just to use the ones we already have.

States have reckless endangerment laws that criminalize knowing conduct creating a substantial risk of injury. Big oil knew its pollution would cause dangerous weather and did it anyway. Some states also have laws against risking “catastrophe,” meaning widespread injury or damage. Pennsylvania and New Jersey - hit hard by the July heatwave - have such laws. Case law shows they’ve been used against people who lied about a danger, like Philadelphia pier operators who covered up a collapse risk. Swap “pier” for “climate change,” and it fits perfectly. Then there’s involuntary manslaughter: recklessly causing death. A recent analysis suggests extreme heat from climate change may have killed over 20,000 in Europe last month alone. A Washington state court just allowed a wrongful death lawsuit against fossil fuel companies for a climate-induced heatwave death to proceed to trial.

Of course, the scale of liability will only grow - this is the coolest summer of the rest of our lives. But waiting for a perfect tribunal isn’t necessary. Climate victims deserve justice now, and prosecutors have all the tools they need to start charging big oil today. So next time someone calls a climate disaster a crime, remember: it’s not just rhetoric. It’s time to treat it like one.