Trump Announces U.S. Withdrawal From The Paris Climate Accord

via The Global Warming Policy Forum (GWPF)
http://www.thegwpf.com

President Donald Trump has made good on his campaign promise to withdraw from the Paris climate agreement, undoing a crowning achievement of the Obama administration.

Trump promised to “cancel” the Paris Agreement on the campaign trail, but his own White House was split on the issue. The president already issued executive orders to roll back Obama-era global warming regulations.

The White House said that the Paris Agreement was poorly negotiated by the Obama administration and did not put American workers first. White House aides said the administration would withdraw from the Paris accord using the process laid out in the agreement.

Under this process, the U.S. wouldn’t fully withdraw until November 2019 — more than two years from now.

“President Trump has done the right thing by withdrawing from the Paris Agreement,” Tom Pyle, president of the American Energy Alliance (AEA) who headed Trump’s Energy Department transition team, told The Daily Caller News Foundation.

Trump’s announcement came after European leaders pleaded with him to stay in the Paris Agreement at the G7 conference in late May. However Trump could not be swayed, as reports surfaced in the wake of the G7 meeting the president had decided to withdraw from the Paris accord.

“He should be commended for recognizing it was a bad deal for American workers and would have caused continued harm to those around the world who suffer from energy poverty,” Pyle said. “Despite an intense lobbying effort from corporations, green lobbyists, U.N. bureaucrats, and the Al Gore’s of the world, Trump stood firm on his commitment to resetting our energy and environmental policies.”

Most Republicans and conservative groups opposed staying in the Paris Agreement, saying it posed a legal risk to Trump’s deregulatory efforts and sent mixed signals to the rest of the world. They also argued that staying in the agreement without Senate approval set a bad constitutional precedent.

President Barack Obama joined the Paris Agreement in 2016 without Senate approval, pledging to cut U.S. greenhouse gas emissions 26 to 28 percent below 2005 levels by 2025.

White House chief strategist Steve Bannon, general counsel Don McGahn and EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt were the leading voices in the administration calling for a Paris withdrawal.

“Thanks to President Trump, we will never have Paris,” AEA’s Pyle said.