California Gov. Jerry Brown bashed President Donald Trump’s record on the environment Thursday, saying that Trump will be remembered on climate change as a “liar, criminal, fool — pick your choice.”
The Democrat spoke out against the president in introductory remarks at the Global Climate Action Summit that he’s co-hosting in San Francisco.
Brown also ripped Trump for taking steps to try to dismantle California’s vehicle emissions standards, rolling back federal controls on power plant pollution, and easing regulations on methane emissions from oil and gas operations.
“When Trump says, in effect, ‘We like more methane going into the air,’ that is highly destructive, very highly destructive,” Brown said.
He characterized Trump’s designs to dismantle environmental protections as a “major assault on the well-being of the people of California and America and the world. It borders on not only insanity but criminality.”
Despite Trump’s position, Brown underscored that thousands of cities and states are committed to reducing global warming even without the president’s support.
The Trump administration and California, the fifth-largest economy in the world and the state with many of the strictest environmental rules in the nation, have been at loggerheads over the environment right from the start.
Brown on Monday signed into law Senate Bill 100 which pledges that the state will obtain 100 percent of California’s electricity from clean sources by 2045. The measure also establishes benchmarks requiring energy providers to generate 50 percent of their power from renewable resources by 2026.
After signing the law, Brown complained to Bloomberg that Trump has “designated himself” the “enemy of the people,” adding: “I’m calling him out because climate change is a real threat of death, destruction and ultimate extinction.”
Protesters outside the summit Thursday accused Brown of not doing enough to protect the environment, and demanded he bring an end to the extraction and processing of fossil fuels in the state.
