Once again, U.S. President Donald Trump has shown his readiness to defy both international opinion and common sense to make a political point. His decision to withdraw the United States from the Paris Agreement on climate change, while generating dismay and outrage, was expected nevertheless. This move will not generate the economic benefits that Trump promised — but it will (and already has) damaged U.S. credibility and standing in the international community as it now joins Nicaragua and Syria as the only countries to remain outside the agreement's purview.
In a June 1 speech in the White House Rose Garden that was littered with falsehoods, the president announced that the U.S. would immediately cease all implementation of the climate accord and "the draconian financial and economic burdens the agreement imposes on our country." Trump claimed that compliance "could cost America as much as 2.7 million lost jobs by 2025" and by 2040 would "cost close to $3 trillion in lost GDP and 6.5 million industrial jobs." Meanwhile, Trump said, the accord imposes "no meaningful obligations on the world's leading polluters," such as China and India. In fact, the president claimed, the rest of the world "applauded" when Washington signed on "for the simple reason" that it put the U.S. at "a very, very big economic disadvantage." Finally, Trump asserted that full implementation of the deal would only yield reductions in global temperature of two-tenths of 1 degree Celsius by 2100.
Every one of the U.S. president's claims is false or misleading. The first set of numbers reflects economic modeling based on draconian policies, nothing that is called for in the Paris Agreement. That study also explicitly excludes any potential benefits from avoided emissions or innovation in the energy field. Claims that other countries are exempt and that their support for the deal stemmed from restraints imposed on the U.S. are also false. All signatories have made their commitments, and the U.S. was instrumental in pushing for the accord, so to imply that the U.S. was singularly punished is wrong. Applause for the agreement reflected a sense of accomplishment for protecting the planet. Finally, the scientists behind the study Trump cited to minimize its impact have disavowed his use of their work, noting that the baselines it and he uses are different and that even if cuts in emissions are less than hoped for, they are better than nothing.