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- Barack Obama condemned GOP politicians, including Donald Trump, who deny climate science.
- He blamed the GOP for not just "sitting on the sidelines," but expressing "active hostility to climate science."
- Speaking in Glasgow, the former president said the US has "a more vigorous opposition to climate than in many other places."
Former President Barack Obama condemned Republican politicians, including former President Donald Trump, who deny climate science during his speech at the international climate summit in Glasgow on Monday.
Obama said the US should lead the world in fighting global warming. But his administration's efforts to address the climate crisis were hurt by Republican lawmakers who "decided to not only sit on the sidelines," but express "active hostility to climate science." He said President Joe Biden is contending with the same obstructionism.
"Of course, back in the United States, some of our progress stalled when my successor decided to unilaterally pull out of the Paris Agreement in his first year in office," Obama said, referring to Trump's controversial move. "I wasn't real happy about that."
Obama acknowledged that other world leaders face similar challenges in their countries when it comes to climate, but argued that the US has "a more vigorous opposition to climate than in many other places."
The former president pointed out that Republicans haven't always denied climate science or obstructed action on the issue, suggesting that their anti-science stances now are political.
"I welcome any faction within the Republican Party in the United States that takes climate change seriously," Obama said. "And that may be a rare breed right now, but, keep in mind, such elected officials used to be commonplace, used to exist. President George H.W. Bush, a Republican, was one of the first US presidents to officially recognize the threat of climate change, was a signatory to the Rio Accord."
Obama praised the current administration's efforts to pass major climate fighting provisions in the Build Back Better Act. He declared that, under Biden, "the US government is once again engaged and prepared to take a leadership role" fighting climate change.
Leading Republicans in Washington continue to deny the scientific facts that climate change is largely caused by human activity and will have catastrophic effects worldwide if greenhouse gas emissions aren't significantly curbed. Republicans often falsely claim that changes in the climate are natural and impossible for humans to affect.
Trump withdrew the US from the 2015 Paris Climate Accord, reversed hundreds of environmental regulations, approved the Keystone XL pipeline, and called climate change a "hoax."
Last week, House Republican whip Steve Scalise, the second-highest ranking Republican in the chamber, denied climate science and rejected the evidence showing that climate change is making natural disasters, including hurricanes and wildfires, more severe and frequent.
"Carbon emissions have been around since before man walked the earth," he told reporters. "It gets warmer, it gets colder, that's called Mother Nature."
In July, Sen. Ron Johnson, a Wisconsin Republican, called climate change "bullshit."