An Earth Day message from the White House praises President Donald Trump, a man who once claimed climate change was a hoax created by the Chinese, as the long-awaited president who follows science.
The press release sent out Tuesday, titled “On Earth Day, We Finally Have a President Who Follows Science,” lists an assortment of actions Trump has taken that the White House claims are actually good for the environment, despite every major conservation group saying the opposite.
By “pausing restrictive emissions rules for coal plants,” Trump has “accelerated responsible energy and infrastructure projects,” the release says. By clamping down on wind energy, Trump is “recognizing wind turbines’ detrimental environmental impact, particularly on wildlife, which often outweighs their benefits,” the release says, pushing the myth that wind turbines have any significant impact on bird populations.
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“President Trump is protecting public lands,” the release states before explaining he’s “prioritized access to federal lands for energy development” ― something conservationists have said is an environmental nightmare.
On his first day in office, Trump signed a litany of executive orders to reverse existing climate policy. Those included withdrawing the United States from the Paris climate accords; declaring the nation’s first “energy emergency” to speed up fossil fuels permitting, nuclear power and mining; halting offshore wind development; and opening up Alaska’s Tongass National Forest, the largest federally protected forest, to increased logging.
Tuesday’s press release describes the expansion of logging on public lands as “safeguarding millions of acres of forestland, improving wildlife habitats, and supporting rural economies at the same time.”
The characterization of Trump as a president who finally “follows science” is also out of step with his choice of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., one of the loudest voices in the anti-vaccine movement, to lead the Health and Human Services Department.
And in the past two months, the journal Nature found, the Trump administration has terminated nearly 800 research projects funded by the U.S. National Institutes of Health, with tens of thousands of scientists being told that their research “no longer effectuates agency priorities.”