Though President Trump indicated in some ways last week that he may be taking a new view on the Paris Climate Agreement, the President has reportedly told many close to him that he will be withdrawing the U.S. from the international agreement soon.
According to several sources close to the President, Trump has been telling anyone and everyone that he will be taking the U.S. from the newly established climate agreement.
Reportedly, Trump has even told EPA administrator Scott Pruitt that he plans to remove the U.S. from the agreement, a decision of which Pruitt most certainly approves.
Despite these reports, Trump is still publicly undecided on what the U.S. will do regarding the agreement, indecision which has many world leaders concerned. In the case of China, that the U.S. would so willingly give up its leadership position in the agreement is an enticing prospect.
Environmental advocates and scientists are of course alarmed that the U.S. would take such a combative position regarding climate change. Doing so would be to pull out from the most decisive action the modern world has taken to roll back our ongoing climate disaster.
Many had hoped that Trump’s daughter Ivanka as well as her husband Jared Kushner might be the tempering presence to Trump’s anti-environmental bent. Trump has been known to wildly shift his view on major topics based on whomever he last spoke with, but in this case, he appears to be sticking to his initial views.
Unfortunately, after having spent a week in close quarters with both individuals on his first international trip, their pro-Paris agreement stances appear to have had no effect.
The Paris Climate Agreement was the particular effort of President Obama who spearheaded the campaign. In December of 2015, the U.S. came together with many other key nations in an international agreement that they would, among other promises, commit to doing what was necessary to keep global temperatures from rising beyond 2 degrees in the next several decades.
Doing so would help mitigate some of the impending worst aspects of global warming and help to reverse some of the damage done during decades of industrialization and human expansion.
