No Administration Delegation Will Attend CRAP-30; Former State Dept: "Most Countries Would Prefer There Be No US"
The Trump administration has confirmed that no high-level representatives will be sent by the US to upcoming UN climate talks in Brazil, underscoring the administration’s hostile stance towards action on the climate crisis. The US has always sent delegations of various sizes to UN climate summits over the past three decades, even during periods under George W Bush and in Donald Trump’s first term, where there was scant desire to address the global heating crisis.
But the talks in Belém next month are set to be devoid of an official American presence to an extent never seen before. Trump has called the climate crisis a “hoax” and a “con job” and has said the US will withdraw from the Paris climate agreement, which calls for countries to limit the dangerous global temperature rise.
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“The president has made it clear he wants to withdraw from the Paris agreement so it doesn’t surprise me they aren’t sending anyone because they aren’t engaged in this,” said Todd Stern, a former lead climate negotiator for the US during Barack Obama’s presidency. “I don’t think they would add anything useful. This is a much more aggressive administration now, across the board. I think the great majority of countries aren’t going to pay attention to that, they know climate change is real, you just have to look out of the window to see it is getting worse.”
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One former senior state department official, speaking anonymously, said that it was preferable that the US not attend the talks so that other countries can strike a stronger climate agreement. “If the choice is no US or a US that is there as a spoiler, to wreck and disrupt things, then I think most countries would prefer there to be no US,” the former official said.
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https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/oct/31/cop30-climate-us-officials