Let us first call a “spade a spade”. The Paris Climate Agreement is not a legally binding treaty proposed by the Obama Administration and ratified by the Senate. This agreement is a mere “sole executive agreement”
which is the lowest form of commitment the United States can make and still be party to an agreement.
Thus President Trump can withdraw from this non-enforceable agreement fairly easily and quickly. Trump should withdraw the U.S. entirely from this agreement, and I suggest he will.
In November 2015, President Obama sidestepped Congress and agreed in principle to sign this Paris agreement without Congressional support.
Obama then proceeded to issue an executive order authorizing his Secretary of State John Kerry to sign the formal agreement on behalf of the United States, knowing full well that there was strong majority opposition in the Senate to this Paris climate agreement.
Trump is on firm ground to withdraw from this Paris climate agreement for both political and economic reasons.
Throughout the election campaign Trump promised numerous times to pull out of the agreement.
He won the election in certain fossil fuel-oriented states in part on this promise. Kiboshing this agreement would be a justifiable fulfillment of his campaign promise.
Trump also argued that “ global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive.”
That statement was typically Trumpian. But Trump’s political instincts were bang on.
Trump intuited that his base of support; voters in America’s hinterland, the midwest states and the southern states believed their industrial/ manufacturing/coal-based/ and oil and gas- based jobs would be at risk if America pursued and complied with this American job-killing Paris agreement.
Hillary and the death knell of Obama’s Paris climate agreement
During the campaign Hillary Clinton privately bragged to her eco-activist supporters that if elected she would close down the coal mines and put the coal companies and miners out of business. Hillary came across as anti-coal and anti-fossil fuels which included oil and gas companies and even the auto industry. When Hillary’s private comments were leaked, all of a sudden such Democratic working class/union strongholds as Pennsylvania, Michigan were in play.
Trump knew, I knew and even Hillary knew that by those comments she had fatally hurt her political chances in some swing states. Hillary never talked about climate change again in the campaign. But the damage had been done. That was the death knell of Obama’s Paris climate agreement.
Economically, the Paris agreement is a job-killing disaster for the U.S. as well. Obama pledged pursuant to this Paris agreement to reduce America’s emissions 26-28% from 2005 levels by 2025, a mere 8 years away. In addition, Obama pledged for the U.S. to contribute billions of dollars by 2040 to an international fund (ie slush fund) set up to assist developing countries from the impact of global warming.
According to National Economic Research Associates Economic Consulting, if the United States met all of its commitments as part of the Paris climate accord, it would cost the American economy $3 trillion and 6.5 million industrial sector jobs by 2040. Since countries like China and India have fewer obligations under this agreement, these countries using their abundant low cost coal resources will also out compete American energy producers.
For the above reasons this is a horrible deal for America. I am confident that America’s number one dealmaker will withstand G7 pressure and pull the plug on this climate agreement once and for all.
Mitch Wolfe, a graduate of Harvard University, is the author of “Trump: How He Captured The Trump White House”, which he wrote and had published prior to the election. (available on Amazon.com)
