Putting the Existential Threat of Climate Change Front and Center

Putting the Existential Threat of Climate Change Front and Center

Putting the Existential Threat of Climate Change Front and Center

Until recently, the US mainstream media featured more climate silence than climate science.

Copy Link
Facebook
X (Twitter)
Bluesky
Pocket
Email

EDITOR’S NOTE: Each week we cross-post an excerpt from Katrina vanden Heuvel’s column at the WashingtonPost.com. Read the full text of Katrina’s column here.

When President Trump and Democratic nominee Joe Biden meet on the debate stage next week, many West Coast wildfires will almost certainly still be raging. Moderator Chris Wallace should ask the candidates about climate change, an issue on which they are starkly divided.

Biden believes that climate change is an “existential threat” that demands immediate, far-reaching action—what scientists the world over have been saying for decades. Given Trump’s recent remarks to California officials, we shouldn’t expect much science from his administration—more of Trump’s Earth-is-flat promises that temperatures will magically “start getting cooler, you just watch.”

In good news, the eerie orange sky over San Francisco is returning to blue, and firefighters are making progress against several of the most significant wildfires. But, critically, that doesn’t mean the larger issue is going away.

Read the full text of Katrina’s column here.

Hold the powerful to account by supporting The Nation

The chaos and cruelty of the Trump administration reaches new lows each week.

Trump’s catastrophic “Liberation Day” has wreaked havoc on the world economy and set up yet another constitutional crisis at home. Plainclothes officers continue to abduct university students off the streets. So-called “enemy aliens” are flown abroad to a mega prison against the orders of the courts. And Signalgate promises to be the first of many incompetence scandals that expose the brutal violence at the core of the American empire.

At a time when elite universities, powerful law firms, and influential media outlets are capitulating to Trump’s intimidation, The Nation is more determined than ever before to hold the powerful to account.

In just the last month, we’ve published reporting on how Trump outsources his mass deportation agenda to other countries, exposed the administration’s appeal to obscure laws to carry out its repressive agenda, and amplified the voices of brave student activists targeted by universities.

We also continue to tell the stories of those who fight back against Trump and Musk, whether on the streets in growing protest movements, in town halls across the country, or in critical state elections—like Wisconsin’s recent state Supreme Court race—that provide a model for resisting Trumpism and prove that Musk can’t buy our democracy.

This is the journalism that matters in 2025. But we can’t do this without you. As a reader-supported publication, we rely on the support of generous donors. Please, help make our essential independent journalism possible with a donation today.

In solidarity,

The Editors

The Nation

Ad Policy
x