Trump and Climate Change: The End of the World?
Trump’s expected bonfire of environmental policy spells disaster for people and planet. But only if we let him.
The election of Donald Trump to the US presidency sent a shockwave into the hearts of many over the world. For many environmentalists it feels like a living nightmare: a climate denier at the helm of the most powerful state, ready to shred hard-won victories and tear the laboured consensus that gave rise to the Paris Agreement.
Some experts and activists were scathing in their response. Atmospheric scientist Michael Mann declared: “I fear [Trump’s election] may be game over for the climate.” “Trump will be the first anti-science president we have ever had,” remarked physicist Michael Lubell.
Geoffrey Kamese of Friends of the Earth Uganda rued that: “people on this continent [Africa] will pay with their lives for the results of this election.” Wilfred D’Costa, of the Asian Peoples’ Movement on Debt and Development, said, “here we have a president who is going to accelerate the suffering of the common people all over the world. We cannot accept this death sentence.”
A narrative of “the end of the world” rang across the flurry of post-electoral editorials. “Widespread suffering and misery from climate change are now effectively inevitable”, said David Roberts in Vox. “Donald Trump Could Put Climate Change on Course for ‘Danger Zone”, wrote Coral Davenport in The New York Times. There is some reason behind the rhetoric, for Trump’s environmental positions and policies spell disaster for people and planet.
On the campaign trail, Trump promised to dismantle the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), reopen coal mines, repeal the Clean Power Plan, approve the Keystone XL pipeline, slash renewable subsidies, and “cancel the Paris Agreement”.
In October, he released his “100-day action plan to make America great again,” which includes the lifting of restrictions on fossil fuel production and the cancellation of payments to United Nations climate change programmes.
Communities challenging extractive projects under Obama may now encounter an even more militarised and repressive reaction. In the case of Standing Rock, the Oceti Sakowin resisting the Dakota Access Pipeline will now encounter a president who has investments in pipeline stakeholders Energy Transfer Partners (ETP) and Phillips 66, and received over US$100,000 in campaign donations from the ETP chief executive.
Climate change denier Kevin Cramer served as his energy adviser during the electoral campaign and Myron Ebell, another prominent denier, is now leading the EPA’s transition work and is rumoured to be in line to head the agency. Mike McKenna, a fossil fuel lobbyist who previously worked for Koch Companies and Dow Chemical, is set to head the Energy Department, and oil executive Forrest Lucas is reported to soon lead the Interior Department, which oversees US public lands.
Trump’s expected bonfire of environmental policy, and his extravagant abdication of responsibility for the gravest threat humanity faces is emblematic of the callousness with which he has treated so many groups. But we cannot give in to the painful temptation of desperation. Apocalyptic despair is often just another shape of indifference, a form of immunising ourselves to our responsibilities. If all hope is lost, then why do anything?
The hidden hope
As we grapple with this nightmare we should remember a few things:
Firstly, the urgency of tackling climate change and the deficient response of most governments precedes Trump. We only have three years left to force emissions to fall if we want to stay below a 1.5°C increase, a guardrail treasured by the world’s most vulnerable peoples. According to the United Nations Environmental Programme, under the current pledged actions of governments, we are heading for 3.5°C of global warming. Most worryingly, a new study in Nature suggests that previous impact models may have underestimated the climate’s sensitivity to emissions. It argues that if “business as usual” prevails, we will instead be heading for a cataclysmic 4.78°C to 7.36°C of warming by 2100.
Secondly, Trump is not the world. The Paris Agreement was agreed by 196 nations, and 111 states have already ratified. One country and one president cannot derail a global process, and other states will move forward with their actions. Whilst Trump’s likely exit is disastrous, and there are concerns that such a move may encourage a weakening of action from richer states, strong signals emerged at the Marrakesh COP22 conference indicating the rest of the world remains committed to building on the post-Paris momentum.
If a Trump-led diplomatic corps does blockade, the remaining governments must isolate the US government and prevent it from toxifying international climate cooperation. Already both activists and establishment politicians have suggested financially sanctioning the US is it decides to leave the Paris Agreement.
Thirdly, Trump is not the US. Not only he did he lose the popular vote, but the election that delivered his presidency also saw voters in local districts ban fracking, ban single-use plastic bags, and support candidates with strong environmental records. The country Trump has appealed to is also the country whose social movements defy pipelines, move trillions away from fossil fuels, challenge air pollution, build major renewable infrastructure, and give life to a new economy. Even under Trump’s rule, US emissions are likely to decline, largely due to actions on the local level.
Fourthly, Trump is not omnipotent. Despite the control Republicans will exert over all three branches of government, Trump’s ability to eviscerate environmental legislation faces procedural obstacles and an emboldened environmental movement. Some of the largest groups and grassroots organisations in the country have already pledged to resist threats by Trump. As US environmental lawyer Maya Golden-Krasner affirmed at COP22, “Trump’s anti-climate agenda will unleash US grassroots action like the world hasn’t seen before.”
Encouraging technological and economic trends in renewable energy, and emission reduction plans already in motion across cities and states will also temper the damage caused.
President Obama should use his remaining months in office to do everything possible to bolster climate action. In the last weeks, the White House announced new investments in renewable energy, and cordoned off oil expansion in the Arctic. Obama should add to those efforts by cancelling the Dakota Access Pipeline, ending new fossil fuel extraction permits, and affirming US commitments to climate finance.
Fifthly, from a particular lens, it’s worth noting that Trump’s election doesn’t drastically change the US’s contribution to global progress on climate change. The USA is currently the world’s second biggest emitter of greenhouse gases, responsible for 16 per cent of global emissions. It is also the world’s largest historical emitter, taking up 28 per cent of past emissions.
While analysts have warned that Trump risks making the US a climate “free-rider”, the US has always been a free-rider. Since the genesis of the UNFCCC, it has used its political might to impede negotiations, outmuscle opponents and dilute standards. Much of climate negotiations have as a result revolved around getting the US on board. Despite Obama’s effusive words on environmental action and his self-ascribed role in brokering the Paris Agreement, his administration’s efforts have been deficient. The US has only pledged to fulfill a fifth of its fair share of climate action, and is on course to miss even these weak targets.
Sixthly, Trump’s election should also encourage us to question our framing of climate change and the ways in which we organise, because the climate movement cannot beat Trump on climate alone. Unless the politics of climate action are wedded to broader visions of justice and economic renewal, and are articulated in ways that speak to the needs of the marginalised and neglected, then environmental advocates will lack the civic power necessary to resist the worst, and enact transformative change.
There is some consensus to build on.
The vast majority of both Trump and Clinton voters share a support of renewable energy and want to prioritise its deployment over fossil fuels. Most Republicans back international action on climate change, and Americans of all political affiliations are increasingly concerned over the consequences of climate change. If framed in the abstract language of emissions targets and multilateral agreements, climate change action risks remaining in its enclosure of apathy. But if expressed in the language of jobs, fairness, health, and opportunity, then the possibility for broadening the movement is at least opened.
Clutching at our data and reasoned arguments alone will be insufficient. As climate scientist Emily Shuckburgh lucidly remarked in the wake of Trump’s victory: “a significant theme of recent political discourse has been the use and misuse of evidence. In moving forward, rather than bemoan a “post-truth world”, those of us who have roles in gathering, curating and disseminating evidence must strive to understand the process of human decision-making better.”
It’s not just about climate change.
We must also remember that the threat posed by a Trump administration is not just to action on climate change, but to human rights, equality, poverty, peace, democracy, gender equity, migrant and racial justice. All these issues are firmly interlinked, and to reductively fixate on climate change at the expense of simultaneous urgencies is to misread the depth of the pain we may sink into.
Atmospheric scientist Ken Caldeira put it starkly when he stated: “Trump has advanced a divisive racist, sexist, and xenophobic agenda. He has advocated the use of torture and the killing of families of suspected terrorists. If, after his efforts we are in a good enough shape that climate change still seems like one of our most pressing issues, Trump will have damaged our country and the world far less than I anticipate.”
Left normalised and unchallenged, Trump’s presidency will wreak devastating blows to those he has scapegoated. The echoes of history’s precedents is all too clear. In a powerful open letter, over one hundred Jewish historians wrote, “Our reading of the past impels us to resist any attempts to place a vulnerable group in the crosshairs of nativist racism. It is our duty to come to their aid and to resist the degradation of rights that Mr. Trump’s rhetoric has provoked.”
That duty is not exclusive to America, for Trump is not alone. As far-right populism surges across the world, 2017 will bring a number of elections that risk elevating climate deniers and xenophobes into office around the world.
The bar is high. Those of conscience who treasure life must defend the vulnerable, win victories where we are strong (states, cities, districts, communities) and build power where we are weak. Trump’s mistaken and hateful policies will fail those he has promised to help, and a hopeful, progressive vision needs to replace his own.
Finally, let us remember that with climate change the world does not end, it breaks. Gradually, excruciatingly, traumatically, the ecosystems and communities that thread together what we know as life are unwoven. This is already happening, to devastating consequence.
What we do today has major life-saving implications, so rather than using the fear of forthcoming apocalypse, or the language of an unthinkable future, we must use the moral urgency and possibility of the now. The impacts of climate change are already devastating the world’s most vulnerable populations, including many in the US.
There are no words that bear the scale of what is unfolding and what may lie ahead. But we cannot afford not to rise up to the historic junctures in front of us.
