Gavin Newsom flies to UN climate summit

“We’re in Brazil,” California Gavin Newsom said. “One of our great trading partners. One of the world’s great democracies. I mean, hell, you need rare Earth minerals, this is the country we should be engaging with. Instead, middle finger with 50 percent tariffs. That’s shameful.”

That’s certainly a point to argue, but the question is why, exactly, was Newsom in Brazil, telling the gathered at a UN climate summit that the Trump administration had “disrespected” them?

“I’m here in the absence of leadership of Donald Trump,” he told a Sky News reporter. “He’s abdicated responsibility on a critical issue. I’m here to show up on behalf of my country. I’m here to showcase California’s leadership, dominance in the low-carbon greenco space. I’m here because it’s about more than electric power, it’s about economic power, and I’m not going to cede America’s economic leadership to China.”

Newsom was all over the summit, meeting with Sonia Guajajara, Brazil’s minister of indigenous peoples, appearing on a panel saying that his zero-emissions vehicle mandate has “shifted consciousness,” and saying in regards to green energy competition from China, that “the United States of America is dumb as we wanna be on this topic, but the state of California is not.” He also blamed the Los Angeles wildfires on climate change, even though authorities recently arrested an arson suspect in connection with the Palisades Fire.

As he usually does, Newsom got the White House’s attention. In a statement, the press office said, “Governor Newscum flew all the way to Brazil to tout the Green New Scam, while the people of California are paying some of the highest energy prices in the country. Embarrassing! If Gavin Newscum’s support for the climate agenda was sincere, he would not be attending a climate summit that required chopping down thousands of acres of protected Amazon rainforest for a special purpose highway. It’s time for Newscum and other countries to drop the climate façade! President Trump will not allow the best interest of the American people to be jeopardized by the Green Energy Scam. These Green Dreams are killing other countries, but will not kill ours thanks to President Trump’s commonsense energy agenda.”

It’s not as though Newsom’s critiques lack substance. China is dominating the green-energy space while the Trump administration provides endless carveouts for big oil. There’s also something deeply disingenuous about Newsom’s endless climate crowing, in his behavior as a self-appointed shadow President to the corners of world politics who don’t like what Trump is up to on climate and other issues. Right-wing populism and Democratic socialism may be ascendant and may garner all the headlines and headspace, but there’s still a lot of money behind Great Reset neoliberalism. Newsom is its slick-haired, alarmist American avatar, a harbinger for a set of policies that people won’t like much when they arrive at their doorsteps.

Even though Newsom’s fire-management policies helped exacerbate an unprecedented disaster in America’s second-largest city, he still had the nerve today to sign a Memorandum of Understanding with a Brazilian territorial governor on wildfire prevention and response. “We’re identifying areas of risk, enhancing forest monitoring, and sharing research and expertise for emergency response.” Ask the people of Altadena how “enhanced forest monitoring” went for them.

“We’re on the tip of the spear of climate change,” Newsom said. The wildfires in LA occurred “in the middle of winter,” which, mind you, can often be warm and dry and windy in Southern California. But Shadow President Newsom, preening about Brazil, doesn’t have to be a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.