With the Trump administration reportedly on the verge of withdrawing from the Paris climate agreement, environmental groups are warning that doing so could make the U.S. an international pariah.
“Withdrawing from the Paris Climate Agreement would turn America from a global climate leader into a global climate deadbeat.”
—Annie Leonard, Greenpeace
News outlets reported Tuesday that the White House could announce as soon as next week that it is pulling out of the 195-nation pact, as President Donald Trump pledged to do on the campaign trail. According to the New York Times, “[t]he decision could hinge on the interpretation of a single phrase in a single provision of a document that took years to write.”
The Times reported:
Politico further explains:
Meanwhile, according to the Huffington Post:
The memo indicates the Trump administration could officially withdraw on Nov. 9, 2019. The withdrawal would be complete one year later.
And that, said Greenpeace executive director Annie Leonard on Tuesday, “would turn America from a global climate leader into a global climate deadbeat.”
“Global climate action is not a legal or political debate, it’s a moral obligation to protect our planet and people,” she said. “That is what almost 200 countries agreed to do in Paris, and if the Trump administration plans to withdraw from the agreement, then other leaders and company CEOs should call the U.S. government out and hold them to account.”
Sierra Club global climate policy director John Coequyt, similarly added that pulling out of Paris “would be a disaster for the United States because it would provoke international blowback [and] harm our global leadership role.”
To that end, Axios reports, environmentalists are now urging other countries to increase pressure on the U.S. to stay in the accord, just as “the leaders of Mexico and Canada reportedly called Trump and persuaded him to renegotiate instead of terminate NAFTA.”
A source told the outlet: “One of the things we’re doing as the green group contingency is to talk to other countries to make sure to tell them that now is the time to make your voice heard.”
Fiji seems to have gotten the message; on Wednesday, Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama urged Trump to “stay the course,” declaring of the U.S.: “We can’t have one of our best performers abandon the field of play.”
“Listen to those around you who are encouraging you to do so,” said the leader of the tiny Pacific nation. “Don’t let the whole team down by leaving when we have a clear game plan and have put so many scores on the board.”
The Trump administration’s latest environmental affront comes on the heels of last weekend’s massive Peoples Climate March, which saw hundreds of thousands of people in the U.S. and abroad calling for climate action.
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