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Tag: white house climate panel
Trump’s Climate Change Panel Under Heavy Congressional Scrutiny

Trump’s Climate Change Panel Under Heavy Congressional Scrutiny

On Thursday, chairs of four different House committees demanded information about Trump’s newest scheme to attack the validity of climate science. The Democrats in charge in Congress are refusing to allow Trump to set up the shady climate change-denying advisory group without any oversight.

A letter sent by Armed Services Chair Adam Smith, Energy and Commerce Chair Frank Pallone Jr., Natural Resources Chair Raul M. Grijalva (D-AZ), and Science, Space, and Technology Chair Eddie Bernice Johnson outlines concerns about “a secret panel, led by a discredited climate change denier,” meant to undermine the scientific consensus on climate change and the threat it poses to America and the world.

That “discredited climate change denier” is William Happer, who has reportedly been tapped to lead the advisory panel. Happer is a Trump administration official currently serving as a senior director at the National Security Council, who has compared climate scientists to Nazis, mass murderers, and members of the terrorist group ISIS.

The four congressional leaders are demanding both to know the names of those who will be on the panel and to be updated on a monthly basis of any work the panel does. Further, the chairs want the panel to be subject to the Federal Advisory Committee Act, which would allow the public to know more about the work of the panel.

The letter also lays out concerns about Trump’s previous statement on climate change, which “fly in the face of explicit scientific evidence and the findings of your own DoD [Department of Defense] and Director of National Intelligence.”

Trump has repeatedly ignored, if not outright attacked, evidence of climate change and warnings from scientists — even those within his own administration. When scientists from 13 federal agencies released the National Climate Assessment — a comprehensive, 1,600-page report on the devastation that climate change — Trump blithely dismissed it.

“I don’t believe it,” Trump said. “No, no, I don’t believe it.”

Trump has no trouble believing racist conspiracy theories about President Obama’s birthplace, will fan the flames of voter fraud conspiracies, and repeats ludicrous conspiracy theories about immigrants entering the United States, but he draws the line at believing scientific evidence on climate change.

The chairs understandably have “serious concerns” about any effort by Trump to “construct a secret committee to question the basic scientific fact of climate change.”

In 2018, voters flooded polling locations to elect a Congress that would hold Trump accountable. Democrats prove once again that they are living up to their promise.

Published with permission of The American Independent.

Trump Adviser Compares Climate Scientists To Nazis, ISIS

Trump Adviser Compares Climate Scientists To Nazis, ISIS

Trump is preparing a panel to attack climate science headed by William Happer, who has compared climate scientists to Nazis, mass murderers, and members of the terrorist group ISIS.

The Washington Post reports that Happer, who is already a senior director in Trump’s National Security Council, is preparing the panel to attack research that has determined climate change is a national security threat.

“The initiative represents the Trump administration’s most recent attempt to question the findings of federal scientists,” the Post notes.

For years, military leaders have been saying that climate change is a threat to American security.

Happer is not a climate scientist but has previously complained about the “demonization of CO2” by those attempting to limit emissions.

According to Happer, accurate depictions of the negative effect of carbon dioxide on the environment “really differs little from the Nazi persecution of the Jews, the Soviet extermination of class enemies or ISIL slaughter of infidels.”

Happer also falsely claimed there is a “war on CO2” going on.

In an unhinged 2014 appearance on CNBC, Happer yelled at New York Times reporter Aaron Ross Sorkin to “shut up” when he confronted him with his previous rants about climate science. Then he doubled down on his comparison.

“The comment I made was that the demonization of carbon dioxide is just like the demonization of the poor Jews under Hitler. Carbon dioxide is actually a benefit to the world and so were the Jews,” he explained.

Happer is a professor emeritus at Princeton and in 2015 was caught agreeing to write a briefing paper financed by the fossil fuel industry to hype the “benefits of fossil fuels to developing economies.”

The panel he is working on for Trump is described in an internal discussion paper as a committee “to advise the President on scientific understanding of today’s climate, how the climate might change in the future under natural and human influences, and how a changing climate could affect the security of the United States.”

The crackpot beliefs and rhetoric espoused by Happer fit right into Trump’s approach to the environment and science. Trump has said that climate change is a “hoax” that was invented by the Chinese government. On several occasions, Trump has stupidly pointed to extreme cold weather as evidence that climate change does not exist.

Republicans overall have embraced wholesale denialism of the global climate change problem, preferring to mock serious solutions to the problem while catastrophes across the world increase thanks to higher temperatures.

Putting Happer in such an important position of influence with science he has actively worked to undermine is a perfect distillation of the Republican approach.

Climate change is real, it is happening, scientists know it, people are dying, and Trump and the Republicans do not care.

Published with permission of The American Independent.