Foreign Secretary Tony Blinken announced on Friday that the United States had formally rejoined the Paris climate agreement, arguing that it would ‘help us all avoid catastrophic planetary warming’ and ‘resilience’ around the world. build up.
The largely symbolic act comes as Biden’s government quickly reversed former President Donald Trump’s energy policy – including the revocation of the Keystone XL pipeline permit. President Biden has also signed executive actions to eliminate federal subsidies for oil and other fossil fuels and has suspended new oil and gas leases in federal lands and waters.
Blinken described the agreement in a statement Friday as an “unprecedented framework for global action.”
“We know, because we helped design and realize it,” he said. “Its purpose is simple and expansive: to help us all avoid catastrophic global warming and to build resilience around the world to the effects we are already having on climate change.”
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Republicans pushed back with the action.
“By rejoining the Paris climate agreement, President Biden indicates that he is more interested in the views of the citizens of Paris than in the work of the citizens of Pittsburgh,” Ted Cruz, Texas senator, said last month. tweeted. “This agreement will have little effect on the climate and harm the livelihoods of Americans.”
Biden signed on his first day in office to rejoin the Paris Climate Agreement. The Trump administration officially abandoned the agreement last year. The Paris Agreement was a global treaty signed during the Obama administration to combat climate change.
Blinken said on Friday that “as important” as the United States’ first entry in 2016 was, and as “important as our reunion today is – what we do in the coming weeks, months and years is even more important.”
Blinken said Americans would “continue to see” the Biden government to interweave climate change in our key bilateral and multilateral talks at all levels and ask global partners to discuss ways to ‘do more together’.
“Climate change and science diplomacy can never again be ‘add-ons’ in our foreign policy discussions,” Blinken said. “Addressing the real threats to climate change and listening to our scientists is at the heart of our domestic and foreign policy priorities.”
He added: “This is crucial in our discussions of national security, migration, international health efforts, and in our economic diplomacy and trade talks.”
Blinken added that the US is re-engaging the world in all areas and noted that Biden will host the leaders’ climate summit in April. Blinken added that the US “is very much looking forward to working with the UK and other countries around the world to make COP26 a success.”
Biden, after attending a virtual meeting of G-7 countries on Friday, said the US and partners “should accelerate our commitments and hold each other accountable.”
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“That’s why I rejoined the Paris Agreement as president,” he said on Friday. “The US is officially a party to the Paris Agreement, which helped us put it together.”
Biden added that the US “is determined to reconnect with Europe” and “regain its position”.
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Biden announced last year that former Secretary of State John Kerry would serve as the special presidential envoy for climate change and sit on the National Security Council – the first time the NSC has included an official dedicated to climate change.