The cause was chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, his wife, Anne Gelbspan, said. Mr. Gelbspan’s career included reporting on dissidents in the Soviet Union and on F.B.I. harassment of domestic critics, and his interest in the climate crisis, like those other subjects, came from a sense of outrage that powerful interests were suppressing information needed for democracy. “I didn’t get into the climate issue because I love the trees — I tolerate the trees,” he said on YouTube last year. “I got into the issue because I learned the coal industry was paying a handful of scientists under the table to say nothing was happening to the climate.”

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Persons: Ross Gelbspan, —, Anne Gelbspan, Gelbspan’s, ”, “ Organizations: Republican, YouTube Locations: Boston, Soviet Union