Former Vice President Al Gore Comments on President Trump’s Climate Decision

After Trump’s decision regarding the Paris Climate Accord on Thursday, June 1, the world erupted in response to his conclusion, both favorably and unfavorably.  Choosing to withdraw the United States from the agreement, he stood against the “draconian” deal and said, “I was elected to represent the citizens of Pittsburgh, not Paris.”

While some may support his decision to leave the accord, others lashed out with anger towards him, deeming his decision “reckless”; French officials, for instance, heavily criticized his decision by editing a White House video discussing the benefits of the withdrawal—the edited video explains to the public the cons that come with the United States’ departure.

            Hilary Clarke of CNN writes, “The video, posted on Twitter by the French Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs, is France’s latest challenge of President Donald Trump’s decision to pull the United States out of the United Nations-brokered deal, which seeks to limit global temperature rises by 2100 to 2 degrees Celsius above levels recorded before industrialization.  In the original 40-second US video, the first slide reads, ‘The Paris Accord is a bad deal for America.’  The new French version tweaks that line to read, ‘Leaving the Paris Accord is a bad deal for America and the world.’”

Former Vice President Al Gore, a symbol for environmental awareness, heavily condemned President Trump’s choice, saying his move was “reckless” and “indefensible”.  He says that the decision “makes no sense to me.  I think it was a reckless decision, an indefensible decision.”

Trump listed viable economic reasons as to why the United States would be benefited with withdrawal, choosing not to remain with other industrial sovereign nations in combating the issue of climate change.  Such efforts to fight against global warming include limiting and reducing greenhouse gases released into the atmosphere that simultaneously pollutes the air and causes temperatures to rise.

Speaking with Trump directly after his victory in the presidential election, Gore made it clear that he wished for the United States to stay in the Paris accord.  He says, “I did my best to persuade him that it was in the country’s best interest.  Climate change is real… The president won’t say it, but it’s true.”

President Trump, who seemed to have made his decision based on a sense of spite and revenge, said on Thursday, “It would have once been unthinkable that an international agreement could prevent the United States from conducting its own domestic affairs… At what point does America get demeaned?  At what point do they start laughing at us as a country?  We don’t want other leaders and other countries laughing at us anymore.  And they won’t be.”

Having seemed to have lost a little bit of hope, Al Gore concludes by saying that Trump’s decision “undermines our nation’s standing in the world and isolates us, [threatening] to harm humanity’s ability to solve this crisis in time… We’re the United States.  We’ll always have a seat at the table.”