Hilary Beaumont

Hilary Beaumont is an investigative journalist on the climate crisis who focuses on how powerful institutions shape the lives and rights of people on its front lines. She reports at the intersection of climate change, Indigenous rights and immigration, often tracing corporate, government and law-enforcement decisions into the communities where they land. Her work appears in the Guardian and other outlets that cover environmental justice, human rights and public accountability.

Climate accountability and fossil fuel power

Beaumont’s climate reporting is defined by a focus on accountability, following fossil fuel companies, politicians and security contractors rather than treating extreme weather as a standalone event. She has reported on how the fossil fuel industry drove the spread of anti‑protest laws across the United States, documenting the legislative tactics used to deter climate and Indigenous rights demonstrations.

Her coverage of major wildfire seasons, including on‑the‑ground reporting from Los Angeles, connects climate‑driven disasters to policy failures and corporate responsibility rather than framing them only as natural catastrophes. In the Guardian, she examines legal and covert efforts to undermine climate critics, including a US court case about hacking campaigns targeting people who challenged Exxon over its climate record.

Across these stories she returns to the same question: who profits from the climate crisis, and what tools do they use to silence opposition.

Indigenous rights, pipelines and water

A second through-line in Beaumont’s work is sustained reporting on Indigenous communities facing resource projects and environmental harm. She has documented Indigenous women’s resistance to Enbridge’s Line 3 pipeline, showing how fears about water pollution, wild rice, climate impacts and exploitation of Native women converge around a single piece of infrastructure.

Her investigations into Indigenous water crises examine long-running failures to provide safe drinking water, treating boil‑water advisories and contamination as symptoms of deeper political and financial neglect. She has also reported on cases of murdered and missing Indigenous women and girls, connecting personal tragedies to systemic issues of policing, jurisdiction and state responsibility. In coverage of solar geoengineering, she writes about how experimental climate interventions cloud questions of tribal consent, foregrounding Indigenous governance and treaty rights in debates that are often framed only as technical climate solutions.

These stories consistently centre Indigenous voices and make clear how climate, energy and environmental policy are experienced on the ground.

Immigration, borders and surveillance technology

Beaumont extends her climate and rights beat into migration and border enforcement, with a particular focus on surveillance technologies. In the Guardian she has reported from the US–Mexico border on high‑tech towers built by defence contractor Anduril, detailing how automated surveillance systems reshape the landscape and the risks that migrants face.

Her work tracks how border infrastructure, private technology firms and government contracts intersect, treating the build‑out of surveillance as part of a broader climate and human‑rights story rather than a narrow security issue. She has written about immigration and data privacy more broadly, examining how authorities and corporations collect and use information about migrants and activists.

Across these pieces she returns to the impact of security and technology decisions on people in transit, tying border policy to climate change, displacement and civil liberties.

Activism, policing and risk to climate defenders

Another strand of Beaumont’s reporting focuses on the risks faced by environmental and Indigenous rights activists. She has examined the life and death of an environmental activist killed by police in the United States, treating the case as a window into how law enforcement responds to direct action against energy projects. Her investigations into anti‑protest laws show how legislatures criminalise tactics commonly used by climate movements, including demonstrations near pipelines and other fossil fuel infrastructure. The hacking case involving critics of Exxon, and her broader work on data privacy, highlight the digital threats that climate advocates can face alongside physical policing. Taken together, these stories show an interest in the full spectrum of pressure on activists - legal, technological and violent - and connect it back to the contest over climate policy and fossil fuel expansion.

Across outlets, Beaumont describes herself as an investigative journalist covering the climate crisis, with work spanning the Guardian, WIRED, Rolling Stone, National Geographic, Al Jazeera, VICE News, The New Republic, High Country News and other publications. Her portfolio shows a consistent focus on climate change as a justice issue, with particular attention to Indigenous communities, migrants, protesters and others who face the sharpest consequences of environmental policy decisions. She has received recognition for reporting on fossil fuels and Indigenous water issues, reflecting the depth and impact of this beat.