Gavin Newsom is most senior US politician at annual talks, heading alternate delegation in Trump’s absence
California governor Gavin Newsom has said Donald Trump is an “invasive species” whose dismissal of the climate crisis is an “abomination”, in a fiery attack at the UN climate talks in Brazil – from which Trump and his administration have been completely absent.
Newsom is the most senior American politician at the Cop30 summit in Belém, after Trump took the unprecedented step of not sending a delegation to the talks. Newsom sought to fill the notable void of official US activity by lambasting the president for tearing up climate policies and pushing for burning more of the fossil fuels that have caused dangerous global heating.
On Tuesday, it emerged that Trump has drawn up plans to open up the coast of California for oil and gas drilling, a move that Newsom said would happen “over my dead body, full stop. He said he wants to open up the coast of California, but he doesn’t want oil-drilling rigs off the coast of Florida, not across the street from Mar-a-Lago. He’s silent on that. But it’s not going to happen. It’s dead on arrival.”
Accusing Trump of an assault upon the climate and on democracy, Newsom said of the president: “He’s an invasive species, he’s a wrecking-ball president. He’s trying to roll back progress of the last century. He’s trying to recreate the 19th century. He’s doubling down on stupid.”
