The Trump administration’s mass firing of State Department employees on Friday included scores of climate and energy experts, as part of a reorganization that will have ripple effects for the global effort to tackle rising temperatures.
The State Department says the restructuring will make it “more accountable, more accessible, and more transparent.” But former officials say it’s a gut punch that will rob the agency of expertise and thwart U.S. engagement on a critical issue it has helped shape.
“It’s crippling,” said Dan Reifsnyder, a former diplomat who spearheaded U.S. climate efforts at the State Department from their beginning. “I think the biggest thing that the United States brings to these international fora are really very bright people, very dedicated people, people with ideas, people with creativity, people with talent.”
Around 75 people focused on climate have left State since Trump took office, along with about two-thirds of a staff of 100 who were fired Friday at the Bureau of Energy Resources, according to estimates from State officials who recently left the agency. The State Department, which declined to release or confirm those figures, fired more than 1,300 people in all Friday.
