President Donald Trump says he’s done with international climate agreements that harm American wealth. Now he may be working to blow them up.
That was the underlying message in a letter the U.S. sent to countries participating this week in global negotiations to put a levy on shipping pollution.
The Trump administration called those talks “blatantly unfair” and urged countries to drop their support for a climate tax. It threatened “reciprocal measures” to offset any fees on U.S. ships if the measure is adopted by the International Maritime Organization.
It’s the latest move by the Trump administration to force other countries to bend to its will, and it sends a worrying signal that the U.S. might employ similar tactics in other international arenas, according to former U.S. officials and environmental advocates. Top among them is the COP30 global climate conference scheduled for November in Brazil.
