Biden is the 1st sitting U.S. president to visit the Amazon : NPR

MANAUS, Brazil — President-elect Donald Trump has vowed to roll again President Biden’s clear power incentives when he takes workplace in January. However on Sunday, Biden used a visit to the Amazon to defiantly assert that his legacy on addressing local weather change couldn’t be simply reversed.

“Some might search to disclaim or delay the clear power revolution that is underway in America, however no person — no person — can reverse it. No person,” Biden mentioned in remarks from a rainforest protect.

Biden is the primary sitting U.S. president to go to the Amazon, a fast cease that was meant as a capstone for his work on local weather, made between two summits he’s attending in South America.

He took an aerial tour of a area that has been by two years of drought, and checked out areas the place bushes had been illegally harvested. Then, he walked alongside a dust path by the sting of the rainforest, assembly with indigenous leaders and Nobel laureate Dr. Carlos Nobre, who research how local weather change impacts the Amazon.

Noting that he’s about to depart workplace, Biden checked off his local weather accomplishments, noting that his clear power investments might assist america reduce carbon emissions in half by 2030.

“I’ll depart my successor and my nation the sturdy basis to construct on, in the event that they select to take action,” he mentioned, arguing that clear power investments have been serving to create jobs. “The query now could be, which authorities will stand in the best way and which is able to seize the big financial alternative?”

Trump left the Paris accord. Biden rejoined it. Now, Trump is poised to give up it once more.

On Biden’s first day in workplace, he signed an order for america to rejoin the Paris local weather settlement to restrict greenhouse fuel emissions. Trump had withdrawn from the accord when he first took workplace in 2017 — and he has promised to depart it once more when he takes workplace in January.

Trump has vowed to intestine the Inflation Discount Act, Biden’s landmark local weather laws that accommodates the biggest federal clear power funding in U.S. historical past.

The White Home has been working to attempt to get funding, initiatives and laws on the books earlier than Biden leaves, anticipating the adjustments forward.

On Sunday, Biden mentioned he had fulfilled a pledge to extend worldwide local weather support to $11 billion. He met with officers from Mombak Gestora de Recursos, an organization replanting bushes with investments from massive tech corporations like Microsoft, which get carbon discount emission credit, in trade. The U.S. authorities is giving Mombak a $37.5 million mortgage for its venture.

And he introduced $50 million for Brazil’s Amazon Fund, bringing the full U.S. contribution to $100 million. Biden final yr had pledged $500 million to the fund over 5 years.

Requested concerning the chance of the incoming Trump administration fulfilling the remainder of that pledge, a senior U.S. official advised reporters touring with Biden: “Who is aware of? Possibly he’ll come down right here and see the forest and see the harm being executed from the drought and different issues and alter his thoughts about local weather change.”