Bernie Sanders: Trump Adviser’s Climate Denial is ‘Dangerous’

Appearing on ABC‘s “This Week” just moments after President Donald Trump’s chief economic adviser and noted Wall Street stooge Larry Kudlow dismissed a new United Nations climate report showing that the world must cut carbon emissions in half by 2030 to avert global catastrophe, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) denounced the White House for its “dangerous” rejection of climate science and slammed Trump for working hand-in-hand with Big Oil to make “a bad situation worse.”

“The comments a moment ago that Larry Kudlow made are so irresponsible, so dangerous that it’s just hard to believe that a leading government official could make them,” Sanders told host George Stephanopoulos after Kudlow—a fervent climate denier—accused the U.N. of overestimating the severity of the climate crisis.

“What the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said is that we have 12 years—12 years to substantially cut the amount of carbon in our atmosphere or this planet, our country, the rest of the world, is going to suffer irreversible damage,” the Vermont senator continued. “We are in crisis mode and you have an administration that virtually does not even recognize the reality of climate change and their policies, working with the fossil fuel industry, are making a bad situation worse.”

Sen. Bernie Sanders says we are in “crisis mode” on climate change and Larry Kudlow’s comments “are so irresponsible, so dangerous that it’s just hard to believe that a leading government official could make them.” https://t.co/iDWHZE9l1L #ThisWeek pic.twitter.com/b3vmo7TjV5

— This Week (@ThisWeekABC) October 14, 2018

Far from taking even the smallest steps toward mitigating carbon emissions and developing a clean energy system that is necessary to avert planetary catastrophe, Trump has worked relentlessly during his first two years in office to free massive oil and gas companies to unleash dangerous pollutants at home while undermining international efforts to confront the climate crisis.

Asked about the IPCC’s dire assessment of the next several decades if immediate, ambitious, and systemic action is not taken to drastically reduce carbon emissions, Trump appeared to indicate that he has never heard of the IPCC.

“It was given to me and I want to look at who drew it,” Trump told reporters. “You know, which group drew it, because I can give you reports that are fabulous and I can give you reports that aren’t so good.”