Scott Waldman:
Well, certainly, Trump, who denies climate science, doesn’t worry about climate change, and just scientists have said for many years that increasing fossil fuel use and consumption is going to drive the worst effects of climate change.
We’re already seeing climate affecting us throughout the country. Obviously, in Los Angeles right now, those wildfires have been fueled by climate change. They have been made worse by climate change. It didn’t start the fires, but it’s made them far worse by creating or contributing to dire drought conditions that have desiccated the landscape and just created fuel for that fire.
There’s also areas where rising sea levels are claiming homes throughout the country. So, certainly just leaning into fossil fuels, stripping away any plans to cut carbon emissions, it’s going to make — it’s going to make that worse.
But, again, we’re talking on such a long time scale here. Four years of the Trump administration are not going to set back the U.S. efforts in a way that won’t be fixable by some future administration down the line. Obviously, every moment now, according to scientists, is important to combat climate change, but it’s not like all hope is lost.
I actually talked to Biden’s climate adviser, former climate adviser, Gina McCarthy, today, and she said she was cheered a little bit after seeing some of these Trump executive orders, because she said they’re just not going to hold up in court. And she knows more is coming to try to dismantle Biden’s climate legacy. But, really, she said it’s going to take a lot more than what we have seen so far.
