Chief of Staff Confirms Climate Denial Will Be Official Policy of the Trump Administration

Incoming White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus pushed back on the suggestion that Donald Trump is “softening” his stance on climate, saying in an interview with Fox News Sunday that the president-elect’s default position on climate change is that “most of it is a bunch of bunk.”

Meanwhile, Kathleen Hartnett White, senior fellow with Koch-connected Texas Public Policy Foundation and a rumored pick for an U.S. Environmental Protection Agency or Interior Department cabinet position, met with the president-elect on Monday. White strongly opposes climate regulations, was once called “an apologist for polluters” during her stint as chair and commissioner of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality and has claimed the coal industry abolished slavery in the British empire.

Military experts also told ClimateWire they worry that the president-elect will downplay climate change as a national security threat. The appointment of Fox News analyst K.T. McFarland as deputy national security adviser probably won’t assuage these fears: McFarland denies the climate-security link and claimed Obama’s attendance at the Paris agreement talks last year gave “encouragement” to terrorists.

For a deeper dive:

News: Houston Chronicle, Morning Consult, ThinkProgress, Greenwire, Politico Pro

Commentary: ThinkProgress, Joe Romm column; The Conversation, Travis N. Rieder op-ed

For more climate change and clean energy news, you can follow Climate Nexus on Twitter and Facebook, and sign up for daily Hot News.