Co-Author of Chilling Climate Change Report Warns of Imminent Threat to Economy
*By Christian Smith*
If you didn't find this weekend's dramatic climate report unsettling, read it again.
Andrew Light, distinguished senior fellow at the World Resources Institute and co-author of the report, said on Cheddar Monday that the effects of climate change are imminent ー unless the federal government acts now.
"It is threatening almost every sector of the economy ー of course more so those sectors that are dependent on natural resources," Light said.
"We should start moving with the most effective and efficient policies that can begin switching our energy sources in earnest from fossil-fuel based to non-fossil fuel based, and also begin to lead the entire country on measures towards adaptation and resilience."
The Trump administration released its dire findings on the Friday after Thanksgiving, timing many have called suspicious ー among them, Politico reporter Matt Daily, who thinks officials meant to bury the news on a holiday weekend.
"I don't know if burying it on Black Friday was a very successful tactic," Daily told Cheddar, noting that the attempt to downplay the news only handed environmental advocates a new line of criticism against the administration.
The [National Climate Assessment](https://nca2018.globalchange.gov/), which is required by federal law to be published every four years, found that climate change will cost the American economy hundreds of billions of dollars by the end of the century and will endanger thousands of American lives each year. The White House issued a [statement](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/25/climate/trump-climate-report.html) saying that the report, which was instituted under the Obama administration, was "largely based on the most extreme scenario” of global warming.
Daily disagreed.
"That's a bit of a stretch, to put it mildly," Daily said. "The report offers quite a wide range of what's possibly coming our way by the end of the century."
Light noted that some states and cities were already moving in the right direction ー but he added the federal government needs to take the lead.
"The U.S. federal government is not leading even though we are seeing states and cities do quite a lot," Light said.
The school shooting in Texas that left 19 children and 2 teachers dead has reignited the debate over gun control.
The tragedy in Uvalde is the deadliest school shooting in nearly a decade and marks the latest in a string of mass shootings in the country. Jared Moskowitz, Broward County Commissioner and candidate for Congress in FL-23, joined Cheddar's Opening Bell to discuss why gun control measures are stalled in the Senate, and where legislation can move forward from here.
Police and detectives are still investigating the tragic school shooting in Uvalde, Texas that killed 19 children and two adults. Cheddar News was joined by Kirk Burkhalter, professor at New York Law School and former NYPD detective to gain some insight on what investigators are looking for and what comes next.
Texas authorities say the gunman who massacred 21 people at an elementary school was in the building for over an hour before he was killed by law enforcement officers.
Join Cheddar News as we break down the top headlines for Thursday, May 26 including updates on the Texas school shooting, President Joe Biden's executive order on police reform, and a recount in the Pennsylvania GOP Senate primary.
Representative Morgan Griffith of Virginia rebuked words from the FDA commissioner that could have been construed as blaming parents for stockpiling baby formula exacerbating the shortage.
Cheddar News reporter Megan Pratz brings the latest from the scene of yesterday's horrific school shooting at a Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas. Now the second-deadliest school shooting in U.S. history with 19 children and two adults killed, Pratz goes into comments by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, details about the deceased shooter, and reactions from members of the community.
The Robb Elementary School mass shooting killing 19 children and two adults in Uvalde, Texas pm Tuesday was the deadliest school shooting since the 2012 Sandy Hook massacre in Newtown, Connecticut, and came just 10 days after the grocery store shooting in Buffalo, New York. Nelson Vergara, the founder and CEO of 360 Protective Solutions, joined Cheddar’s Opening Bell to discuss. "Right now what law enforcement is concentrating on is trying to trace his steps as to what motivated the gunman to act the way he did. What it boils down to just trying to figure out what led to his motivation to do such a horrific act.”
An recently conducted AP-NORC poll found that majorities of the Black and Hispanic populations in the U.S. still find themselves either somewhat worried or extremely worried over the pandemic, while more than half of white Americans responded with either being not too worried or not worried at all. Dr. Chris Pernell, the chief strategic integration and health equity officer at University Hospital, joined Cheddar News to talk about how perceptions of COVID-19 differ between groups of Americans. "We’re still seeing people get infected, and because of the toll of the disproportionate impact, we have concerns among the Black and brown community about whether or not they have an increased risk of exposure because of where they work, because of the use of public transportation, because they live in homes that they may not be able to safely quarantine and or isolate in, and because they have at baseline chronic health conditions that may make coronavirus more severe in those persons," she said.
Judith Enck, a former regional administrator for the EPA and the president of Beyond Plastics, joined Cheddar News to talk about the role of plastics in the climate crisis and California's investigation of ExxonMobil and other oil companies for misleading the public on the ability to recycle plastics. "The reason why petrochemical companies like Exxon have gotten away with selling more and more plastic is that they've lied to the public and told us don't worry about all those negative upstream impacts and downstream impacts of plastics. Just be sure to recycle it. Well, guess what? Plastics largely are not recycled," Enck said.
