The most vicious assault on climate action we’ve ever seen

It will be hard to forget the scene of Trump announcing the U.S. was quitting the Paris Agreement to whooping cheers from 20,000 MAGA supporters. Or the elation from the crowd as he tossed the ceremonial felt-tip marker into the throng. Exuberance over quitting an agreement designed to keep them safer in a world that just clocked its hottest year ever recorded. An agreement that requires nothing from any country other than its own “nationally determined” contributions to global safety.

Instead, the U.S. is determined to “drill, baby, drill,” the president declared in his inaugural speech. “We have something that no other manufacturing nation will ever have – the largest amount of oil and gas of any country on Earth, and we are going to use it.” Hours later, he formally declared a “national energy emergency” to override restrictions on drilling for “liquid gold.” A ludicrous move for a country currently pumping more fossil fuels than any nation in the history of the world.

There’s no sugarcoating it — Donald Trump’s first hours in office were the most vicious and comprehensive assault on climate action that we’ve ever seen. What still remains to be seen is how effective rule-by-Sharpie really is and what reaction it provokes. 

Amidst the firehose of madness, the most hopeful spin I can offer is that there are reasons to expect a counter-reaction. It feels like a thin reed at the moment but public opinion tends to move counter to big changes in politics. The wonky term is the “thermostatic effect” or thermostatic politics. Basically, the public turns the dial when the temperature isn’t right. This thermostatic effect is well-studied by political scientists and you can definitely make the case that Trump’s first term boosted public demand for climate action worldwide. 

But there’s no denying that today’s context looks and feels much different. And Trump’s assault is sweeping. On the climate front alone, he Sharpied executive orders attacking everything from international agreements to lightbulbs.

And the broadsides kept coming. A freeze, not only on offshore wind, as promised, but on all permits for all wind energy, including those on land. Wind has become the leading source of renewable power in the U.S. Paradoxically, most of it comes from reliably Republican states like Texas, Oklahoma, Iowa and Kansas. By the end of the day, the Department of the Interior had gone further still, ordering its staff to freeze permits for all types of renewable energy “onshore or offshore.”

Another order decreed a roll-back of efficiency standards for appliances — dishwashers, washing machines and the like, but even shower heads and lightbulbs. While the energy emergencies of the 1970s catalyzed more efficient use, this time round, consumers are encouraged to be more wasteful, even flipping the switch back to incandescent bulbs. The order promises to “safeguard the American people’s freedom to choose from a variety of goods and appliances, including but not limited to lightbulbs.” Trump has been complaining about LED bulbs for years, saying they make him look orange.

Trump ordered the plug pulled on electric vehicles, with a halt to spending on charging stations and tax credits for buying EVs. The target of EVs making up half of new vehicles sold by 2030 was revoked and Trump moved to roll back existing auto pollution standards which he calls an “EV mandate.” 

He ordered federal agencies to stop spending money under the Inflation Reduction Act, the Biden Administration’s signature clean energy law, which Trump derides as the “Green New Scam.” And he voided the “waivers” that allow states like California to set pollution standards higher than the feds. Not only had 17 other states followed California’s lead but they are also the reference point for provinces like B.C. and Quebec and Canada’s national standards for zero-emission vehicles.

These and many other orders (so many others…) will end up in court and the effectiveness of Trump’s rule by Sharpie will be tested. But it’s worth looking back at the reaction to his first term assaults on energy and climate policies.

You might have to pinch yourself to believe it really happened, but the last time Trump abandoned the Paris Agreement, the premier of Alberta protested by lighting up the Edmonton legislature in green “in support of climate leadership around the world.”

The CEO of Goldman Sachs actually joined Twitter specifically to decry what he called “a setback for the environment and for the U.S.'s leadership position in the world.”

National leaders openly trolled Trump. French President Emmanuel Macron posted memes calling for a global push to “Make our Planet Great Again.” Mayors across Canada and the world pledged to redouble their efforts. Within the U.S., a grand coalition of states and cities, tribal leaders and companies rallied under the banner “We Are Still In.”

Most pinch-worthy of all: a certain Elon Musk publicly quit Trump’s Presidential Councils in protest. “Climate change is real,” he said. “Leaving Paris is not good for America or the world.” 

Hard to square with the Muskanations we see today. But here’s the receipt: 

Musk was emblematic of the time. Mark Zuckerberg denounced Trump, saying the withdrawal “puts our children’s future at risk… Stopping climate change is something we can only do as a global community, and we have to act together before it’s too late.” 

The heads of Apple, Google, Amazon, Microsoft and other tech companies all weighed in. “Wrong for our planet,” said Apple CEO Tim Cook. “Apple is committed to fight climate change and we will never waver.”

The thermostatic effect was clear in real time. Trump’s drive for fossil fuelled dominance rallied opposition. People got angry, vocal and organized. By 2017 the youth-led Sunrise Movement was underway, pushing for sweeping policies like the Green New Deal — a campaign that ultimately emerged, rebranded, as the Biden administration’s Inflation Reduction Act.

By 2018 school strikes were simmering. One short, tumultuous year later, half a million people were marching in Montreal, Greta Thunberg was a household name and TIME magazine’s Person of the Year for 2019. 

There was, in those pre-pandemic times, an undeniable sense of momentum. The mood is much darker this time around. Climate and decarbonization have dropped from public prioritization, displaced by inflation, COVID’s nasty spawn.

And the whole notion of international cooperation sounds credulous in 2025. Trump’s inaugural vow to “expand our territory” echoed across a world that had already become more volatile. A trend described by Tim Sahay, editor of the Polycrisis newsletter, as “The total collapse of global cooperation and multilateralism in favor of the law of the jungle and ‘might makes right.’”

Those same tech titans aren’t waiting to see if Sahay is overstating the situation. They lined up behind the Trump family for his inauguration. Bankers are leaving their net-zero clubs en masse. 

There are a few, fledgling signs of a thermostatic response, if you look hard enough. A group of philanthropists is stepping up to fund the UN climate agency and cover the gap after U.S. withdrawal. From Europe to South America, Africa to China, national leaders reaffirmed their commitments.

As for the social thermostat? All we can really know is that we just don’t know. And it’s a good bet that whatever comes, it won’t be what we expect — a realization that’s both terrifying and a strange source of comfort.