The US will rejoin the Paris climate agreement, but that was the easy part
Joe Biden speaks about climate change and the wildfires on the West Coast at the Delaware Museum of Natural History on September 14th, 2020, in Wilmington, Delaware. | Photo by Drew Angerer / Getty Images
President Joe Biden recommitted the US to the Paris climate accord during his first day in office, fulfilling one of his earliest campaign promises. In 30 days, the US will once again be part of the global accord. Rejoining the agreement is as easy as sending a letter to the secretary-general of the United Nations. What comes after that will be much harder.
The US turned its back on efforts to tackle the climate crisis together as a planet when Donald Trump made the decision to withdraw from the Paris agreement. Trump decimated federal efforts to slash emissions within the US, and he stood by other right-wing leaders — like Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro, who similarly...
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