Foreign Affairs

Kerry Says US Has ‘To Make Up For An Inexcusable Absence’ On Climate Change

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Climate czar John Kerry said Thursday that the U.S. has “to make up for an inexcusable absence” on climate change during an interview with France 24.

“We need obviously to make up for an inexcusable absence by the United States for the last four years even as a lot of our mayors and governors continue to live by the Paris agreement,” Kerry, the U.S. special envoy for climate, said during an interview with France 24. 

“Needless to say, we don’t think we can just walk back in and say ‘hey.’ We gotta earn our spurs, we gotta do things, but we’re here because we need to work together,” Kerry said during the interview. “It is critical that Europe and U.K. now join together to be on the same page. We have to harmonize our efforts.”

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Kerry said Feb. 19 during an interview on “CBS This Morning” that there are only nine years remaining to prevent a climate disaster.

“The scientists told us three years ago we had 12 years to avert the worst consequences of climate crisis. We are now three years gone, so we have nine years left,” Kerry said.

“Even if we did everything that we said we were gonna do when we signed up in Paris, we would see a rise in the earth’s temperature to somewhere around 3.7 degrees or more, which is catastrophic,” Kerry said.

President Joe Biden signed three executive orders on Jan. 20, one of which began the process for the U.S. to rejoin the Paris Climate Accords. The country officially joined the accords again on Feb. 19, according to NPR.