This is the fourth article in an ongoing series focusing on different components of this program. Part 1 focused on Trump’s plans for major attacks on millions of immigrants. Part 2 focused on public health, and the replacement of science and evidence with conspiracy theories and “faith based” approaches. Part 3 laid out the Christian fascist war-mongering mentality of Trump’s nominee for Secretary of Defense. In this article, we get into the climate change deniers and champions of fossil fuel drilling and burning who have been nominated to be in charge of the environment, energy policy, and government agencies that study the environment and climate change.
The two criteria for Donald Trump's appointees to cabinet posts and agencies related to environment and climate issues are 1) firm and unquestioning political-ideological alignment with his overall fascist agenda; and 2) denial of the scientifically-established reality of global warming and climate change, and the existential threat it poses to ecosystems and human civilization. Those are the two boxes that must be checked for admission to high-level posts in the administration.
Oil pumps in Texas. Under the Biden-Harris administration, the U.S. has produced more crude oil than any nation at any time. Photo: AP
Trump himself is notorious for boasting of his denial of climate change, when in fact it is firmly grounded in a huge amount of evidence. Trump campaigned with the slogan “drill baby drill,” and called for an end to any laws or government policies that even partially restrict the mining and drilling of coal, gas, and oil. While Biden set the record for oil drilling and did tremendous damage to the environment (while posturing as the “environmental president”), Trump won’t even pretend to restrict this.
Unless this is stopped—the only way it can be stopped, through revolution—the speed toward extinction of many forms of life on the planet will accelerate at an even more horrific pace.
Climate change has caused drought as well as flooding in Indonesia.
Climate change is real. Climate change has come mainly from the use of coal, gas and oil ("fossil fuels") to power the machinery of society. The use of these fuels releases gases that trap heat in the atmosphere, raising its temperature. This heating process has now crossed a threshold that scientists have warned will be extremely dangerous. The rapid rise in wildfires and hurricanes and droughts, along with the sharp rise in extinctions of species, are early warning signs of what will be disastrous if not reversed. Only a massive and rapid cut in the use of gas, coal and oil has any chance of stopping this.
Like the jackass that he is, Trump brays that what the scientists have concluded is a big “hoax,” a lie. But the level of basic agreement on the danger among climate scientists—based on the actual proof from an incredible amount of research—is overwhelming. Rather than a hoax, these scientific conclusions have themselves been the target of suppression and campaigns of denial sponsored by the capitalist-imperialists themselves, who have a huge stake in the continued use of fossil fuels. The Democrats claim to pay attention to climate science and to be doing something. They do this in order to suck in the many millions who are genuinely and often deeply concerned and even agonizing over this—but this is utter hypocrisy. Again, the Biden presidency broke all records for production of fossil fuels.
What It Really Means to Say “The System” Is at Fault
It is THIS SYSTEM of capitalism-imperialism that sets the foundation and ultimately drives what both Trump and Biden do. Immense amounts of capital have been invested in fossil fuels—over $700 billion. The capitalists who own and control these investments cannot just give up such a massive investment—it would mean their ruin and some other capitalist would just take over. Those are the laws of this expand-or-die system. That applies to capitalists and to capitalist-imperialist nations. Any capitalist-imperialist country that in some way attempts to “opt out” of the battle to dominate the planet will be crushed, dominated, or taken over by rivals who are not “opting out.” (For more on this, go here and here.)
It is not just the massive investments that—according to the rules of capitalism—have to be recouped. Different blocs of capitalist-imperialist powers contend with each other for strategic domination of the globe. Control over oil is crucial to that domination—and all the armies that are essential to that domination depend on oil. For all these reasons, the wrenching transformation needed can only come through revolution against the system of capitalism-imperialism, and the establishment of a new system, based on the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America, authored by Bob Avakian.
Trump Dispenses with Democratic Party Hypocrisy and Takes Off Any Limits
Even the Democrats’ hypocritical lip service to climate science, and the setting of some paltry limits on oil drilling on some public land, is too much for Trump.
Key elements of the Trump program for what he calls U.S. “energy dominance” include:
- Promoting even more massive and reckless expansion of oil and natural gas production and natural gas exports.
- Withdrawing the United States once again, as Trump did in 2016, from the Paris Climate agreement, an international treaty that is supposed to limit global warming and address the effects of climate change. Ineffectual as this agreement is, Trump wants no constraints, however meager and symbolic, on the ability of U.S. imperialism to wield oil and natural gas as weapons in its global great power maneuvering.
- Cutting federal investments and support for renewable (e.g., solar/wind) energy.
- Rolling back existing—but obscenely inadequate—regulations and standards on carbon emissions from trucks, power plants and factories.
- Attacking climate science and muzzling climate scientists at every level of government.
Trump has assembled a cabinet which will be on a mission to carry this out with a vengeance. >>
What Is Needed NOW!
No one should go along with, and every decent person should oppose, the whole Trump regime, including the horrific destruction of the environment, the increase in burning fossil fuels, and the assault on climate science that these fascist reality-deniers are on fire to carry out under Trump. “Taking time” now to somehow step aside or to indulge all kinds of self-pity or “healing” is morally unacceptable and politically—and literally—suicidal. Clinging to the framework of reforming capitalism-imperialism and relying on the Democratic Party to fight this fascist assault on the planet is equally (and in some ways even more) deadly.
There IS a way—not just to resist this (which must be energetically done, beginning now) but to get to a whole new system, one freed from the insane and suicidal constraints and rules of capitalism-imperialism. We are talking about a socialist system in which the new, revolutionary government “will move, quickly, systematically, and effectively to address the already acute and fast accelerating environmental crisis, with the aim of bringing into being a world where humanity can truly be fit caretakers of the earth.” How this can be done is concretely mapped out in the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America.
Join with the revcoms (revolutionary communists) in taking up the revolutionary struggle to defeat this fascist regime as part of fighting for a real revolution and a whole new and better world. Only a revolution and a new socialist society organized on the basis of the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America can open up a way for the people of the world to emancipate themselves and to deal with the climate crisis and environmental crisis.
In the Name of Humanity, We REFUSE to Accept a Fascist America.
A Better World IS Possible.
The Existing Capitalist-Imperialist System And Institutions Of Government In This Country Must Be Abolished And Dismantled—And Replaced By A New, Socialist System Based On The CONSTITUTION FOR THE NEW SOCIALIST REPUBLIC IN NORTH AMERICA.
The Earth Is Now at the Threshold of 1.5 Degrees Increase in Global Temperatures
Scientists have long warned that a 1.5 degree Celsius1 (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) rise of global temperature will cause catastrophic effects. The earth is now at that threshold. The first 12-month period to exceed 1.5°C was February 2023–January 2024. (In order to formally and officially declare that the 1.5-degree barrier has been crossed requires a 10-year average temperature increase over 1.5 degrees. This has not yet happened. But for a one-year average to be this high, and no plans from world governments to radically change the burning of fossil fuels, we can say the planet is crossing the 1.5 barrier.) Climate researcher Zeke Hausfather put it this way: “The goal to avoid exceeding 1.5C is deader than a doornail. It’s almost impossible to avoid at this point because we’ve just waited too long to act.”
1.5 degrees might not seem like much—the temperature varies much more than this in a single day. But it is actually a lot when you are talking about the average temperature of the whole planet over a period of time. This puts the earth outside the range ever seen by our species on this planet. This is what is driving intense hurricanes, melting of glaciers all over the planet, rising and warming seas, with the very real threat of even more catastrophic changes to come. Johan Rockström of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany said, “Are we at risk of crossing a planetary tipping point? Are we at risk of irreversibly pushing the planet on a trajectory where it would unstoppably drift away from a state that can support human life as we know it? We don't have the answer yet, but I can tell you that we are forced to research this question today.”
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FOOTNOTES:
1. Over preindustrial times before humans started burning fossil fuels on a large scale. [back]
Trump's Gallery of Ecocidal Criminals, Lunatics and Christian-Fascist Fanatics
Trump nominated Lee Zeldin as Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Zeldin’s main qualification is that he is a fascist and is willing to follow any orders Trump gives. In accepting the nomination, Zeldin prioritized “restoring U.S. energy dominance” and protecting the U.S. auto industry over any environmental concerns. Zeldin’s time in Congress included voting against a bill to replace lead pipes (water that flows through lead pipes damages the brains of children), and to approve uranium mining near the Grand Canyon (in addition to being used for nuclear weapons, uranium mining is incredibly destructive of the environment). Zeldin can be counted on to do all he can to strip away any EPA regulations that might stand in the way of burning the maximum amount of fossil fuel in the shortest possible time.
During Trump’s first term, three quarters of the scientists at the EPA felt that they were pressured to change scientific conclusions to fit fascist political demands. More than 1,000 scientists left the EPA during Trump’s first term. Yet, even so, government scientists were able to continue to write and publicize reports telling the truth about the climate. In his second term, Trump is banking on Zeldin to go even further in eliminating government scientific research related to climate change and to silence (or purge) those who publish research on the effects of climate change.
Russell Vought was recently nominated to head the Office of Management and Budget, a powerful position he held in the first Trump administration.
Vought is a Christian fascist. He is the leader of the Christian fascist group Center for Renewing America, which says its mission is "to renew a consensus of America as a nation under God.” Vought is one of the main authors of Project 2025 (a game plan for the initial six months of fascist consolidation drawn up by forces close to Trump). Vought has called for Trump to use the Insurrection Act (allowing use of the military against protest) on day one.
In private speeches in 2022 and 2023, Vought laid out plans which included going after people working at the EPA, including scientists who have done things like argue for strict limits on how much lead can be in drinking water:
“When they wake up in the morning, we want them to not want to go to work because they are increasingly viewed as the villains. We want their funding to be shut down so that the EPA can't do all of the rules against our energy industry because they have no bandwidth financially to do so. We want to put them in trauma.”
Trump nominated North Dakota governor Doug Burgum as Secretary of the Interior, a position in charge of managing U.S. federal lands including national parks and wildlife refuges. Burgum was Trump’s liaison to the oil and gas industry during the campaign. He organized the infamous dinner where Trump promised to slash regulations and enact tax breaks on oil and gas if the industry gave $1 billion to his campaign. Burgum was also appointed “Energy Czar” where his job according to Trump will be to “oversee the path to U.S. ENERGY DOMINANCE.” Burgum can be counted on to back “drill, baby, drill” and to remove barriers to drilling on federal land, including some of the most pristine and beautiful places in the country, despite the damage to the planet. The Sierra Club said Burgum has “long advocated for rolling back critical environmental safeguards in order to let polluters profit.”
Trump’s pick for Commerce Secretary, Howard Lutnick, is a fascist who has been co-chair of Trump’s transition team. He is a big-time capitalist in his own right. One of the important agencies that will be under Lutnick in the Commerce Department is NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration), which is a key federal agency responsible for understanding climate. Among other important responsibilities, NOAA is in charge of the satellites that scientists worldwide rely on for information about the climate. Some in Trump’s orbit have called for breaking up NOAA and even dismantling its network of climate satellites. While it is not clear what Lutnick will be able to do, what is clear is that the scientists in NOAA and important programs that are crucial to understanding climate change will be under attack.
Chris Wright Photo: Gage Skidmore via Wikipedia
Trump’s pick for Secretary of Energy and member of Trump’s new National Energy Council is Chris Wright, who has made a fortune in companies specializing in fracking oil and gas. He is a fervent promoter of fossil fuels and fervent denier of climate science. In a 2023 video, Wright said, “There is no climate crisis,” and argued that attempts to address climate change will “slow global progress.” Wright is expected to greatly expand liquified natural gas (LNG) exports, reduce support for renewable energy and increase government subsidies for fossil fuels.
What this adds up to is a fascist cabinet, steeped in denying science, and on a crusade to accelerate the destruction of the planet.