TRUMP AGENDA: Fact-checking Trump’s speech
Jane Timm offers a fact-check of Trump’s climate speech yesterday as he announced his decision to withdraw from the Paris climate accords.
Benjy Sarlin examines Trump’s complains about the “green climate fund.”
World leaders are slamming Trump’s decision to withdraw from the deal.
From the New York Times: “In pulling out of the Paris climate accord, Mr. Trump has created a vacuum of global leadership that presents ripe opportunities to allies and adversaries alike to reorder the world’s power structure. His decision is perhaps the greatest strategic gift to the Chinese, who are eager to fill the void that Washington is leaving around the world on everything from setting the rules of trade and environmental standards to financing the infrastructure projects that give Beijing vast influence.”
And from the Washington Post: “Trump’s decision set off alarms worldwide, drawing swift and sharp condemnation from foreign leaders as well as top environmentalists and corporate titans, who decried the U.S. exit from the Paris accord as an irresponsible abdication of American leadership in the face of irrefutable scientific evidence.”
States like California are filling the void, too. NBC’s James Rainey: “The same week President Donald Trump put America on a rogue path on climate change policy by withdrawing from the 2015 Paris Accords, California's political leaders moved aggressively in the opposite direction. State legislators approved more ambitious carbon reduction goals and Gov. Jerry Brown prepared to go overseas to lead America's anti-global warming agenda.”
How did the decision happen? From the Washington Post: “Trump had never liked the Paris accord. He viewed it as a “bad deal” and during the campaign had promised his base he would “cancel” the climate pact that he believed was hurting American workers. His final, deliberative verdict was the same as his initial, gut-level one, according to this account of Trump’s decision-making process, which is based on interviews Thursday with more than a dozen administration officials, Trump confidants, Republican operatives and European diplomats. Even so, the president listened and moderated months of often heated, and at times downright contentious, discussions among his own advisers, as well as scores of outsiders.”
POLITICO reports that Ivanka Trump is taking her defeat on climate “in stride.” MORE: “Skepticism about how much influence Ivanka Trump and Kushner wield in the White House -- at least as moderating forces -- has been mounting among Democrats. But the failure to move the needle on a major environmental issue was, for many, close to the last straw.”
The AP notes Trump’s penchant for drama when he announces big decisions.
From NBC’s Ken Dilanian: “The Trump administration was gearing up to lift sanctions on Russia when the president took office, but career diplomats ginned up pressure in Congress to block the move, two senior former State Department officials told NBC News Thursday. It's the latest evidence that President Trump moved to turn his favorable campaign rhetoric about Russia into concrete action when he took power.”
The Trump administration is asking the Supreme Court to let the blocked “travel ban” take effect.
Worth noting: Republican Richard Burr is conceding that it’s unlikely the Senate will get a health care deal this year.
OFF TO THE RACES: In Virginia race, it’s national Dems vs. state Dems
GA-06: Wow. Paul Ryan-backed superPAC Conservative Leadership Fund is using images of Kathy Griffin in a new anti-Ossoff TV ad. (A spokesperson for Ossoff said: “Jon Ossoff believes what Kathy Griffin did was despicable and for Karen Handel’s super PAC to say otherwise is a disgrace. Karen Handel should immediately demand this ad be pulled before any more children have to see these disturbing images on TV.”)
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports on how the race is making Georgia Republicans antsy as the state party debates its leadership.
VA-GOV: To those folks who are viewing the Virginia Democratic primary through a Clinton-versus-Sanders lens: There’s actually a much more accurate way to look at the race, writes one of us(!).