Marty Hayden joined Earthjustice in 1995 and led the organization’s Policy and Legislation Department for more than 25 years before assuming his current role in April of 2023. Marty played a leadership role in the multi-year effort that resulted in the $369 billion in climate and environmental justice investments contained in the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. He also helped secure a host of health- and climate-saving administrative safeguards that were finalized in 2024. Over the decades, Marty has been involved in a range of environmental policy efforts, both offensive and defensive.

Marty started at Earthjustice as a forest lobbyist, where he was among the leaders of the effort to secure the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule — protecting 60 million acres of wild national forest lands, including Alaska’s Tongass National Forest. Today, Marty serves as a staff-level Co-Chair of the Climate Action Campaign and Co-Chair of the Arctic Refuge Defense Campaign.

Prior to joining Earthjustice, Marty worked for the Sierra Club in Missouri and Washington, D.C. There, he led the lobbying effort to secure passage of the 9.6-million-acre California Desert Protection Act in 1994 and helped win the first renewable energy production tax credit in the 1992 Energy Policy Act. Marty formerly worked in Alaska’s Tongass National Forest for the Forest Service.

Marty holds a B.S. in fishery biology from Colorado State University.