President Trump yesterday announced he was pulling the United States out of the Paris Climate Agreement in a carefully staged White House Rose Garden event. Even before he finished speaking, leaders from the worlds of international and domestic politics—with the notable exceptions of Trump-world and many but not all Congressional Republicans^—business, and science made strongly worded statements of condemnation. Some corners of the sports world—in particular, green-sports groups like Sport and Sustainability International (SandSI) and Protect Our Winters (POW), also spoke out. Here are their statements, GreenSportsBlog’s take and more.

 
STATEMENTS FROM GREEN-SPORTS WORLD ON U.S. PULL OUT FROM PARIS CLIMATE AGREEMENT
 
Sport and Sustainability International (SandSI)
SandSI is a new global organization made up of sports federations, governing bodies and other parties, including individuals, from 6 continents and nearly thirty countries. It is designed to leverage the combined cultural and market influence of sports in support of healthy, sustainable and just communities.
“Sport and Sustainability International (SandSI) stands united with the global sports industry in support of international cooperation to address the serious threat of climate change, as enshrined in the Paris Agreement. SandSI deeply regrets the decision of the United States to withdraw from the Agreement, and will support all sports federations, leagues, teams, venues, and events in re-doubling efforts to mobilize operations, business partners and millions of fans in response to the urgent global threat posed by worsening climate change. SandSI supports united collective action. We urge all members of the global sports industry, and all fans alike to join Sport and Sustainability International’s work to respond to the increasingly dangerous threat that that climate change poses to current and especially future generations.”
 

Attendees at the inaugural Sport and Sustainability International Congress in Paris. (Photo credit: Sport and Sustainability International)

 
Sport and Sustainability International founding director Allen Hershkowitz’ gave his take on the U.S. exit to GreenSportsBlog Thursday. Click here to read it.
 
Protect Our Winters (POW)
Protect Our Winters (POW) is the leading climate advocacy group for the winter sports community, led by elite skiers, snowboarders and more. In response to Trump’s decision, POW encouraged their followers to take positive action.
 

 
“Trump Bailed on Paris. What’s Next?”
“Today, Trump bailed on the Paris Agreement. With one over-hyped, fancy announcement, he told the nation he’s taking the United States out of the most monumental global climate agreement. We do not accept inaction on climate change. We are extremely disappointed in this decision.
Here at Protect Our Winters, we try very hard to find a silver lining in everything. We want you to have an opportunity to take positive action on every negative rollback. Fortunately, cities, states, and business leaders across the country have already initiated conversations about setting greenhouse gas reduction targets to mimic what was agreed upon in Paris at COP21. We’re really happy to hear this. And, we need you to call your governor and ask them to join this movement. If our federal government won’t do it, let’s ask our governors and mayors to step up.
As always, we made it easy for you. Enter your information to make the call below; we even wrote you a script. Thanks for helping us take action to move our nation forward, not backward, on climate change.”
 
I AM PRO SNOW
Staying in the winter sports world, I AM PRO SNOW (IAPS) brings together winter sports athletes, businesses, resorts, and mountain communities around the world to help stop climate change and shifting to 100 percent clean, renewable energy.
IAPS is a division of the Climate Reality Project, a group founded by Vice President Al Gore in 2006 to bring together a grass roots network of individuals from around the world to, according to its website, “turn climate change awareness into action” to “solve the greatest challenge of our time.”
FULL DISCLOSURE: I am a Climate Reality Leader, trained by Vice President Gore in 2012 to give presentations of an updated version of the “An Inconvenient Truth” slide show and have done so 30+ times.
IAPS did not put out its own statement on Trump’s decision to pull the U.S. out of the Paris Climate Agreement, but the Climate Reality Project put out a long, detailed, call-to-climate-change-fight arms statement. Click here for the link. Al Gore also put out this:
“Removing the United States from the Paris Agreement is a reckless and indefensible action. It undermines America’s standing in the world and threatens to damage humanity’s ability to solve the climate crisis in time. But make no mistake: if President Trump won’t lead, the American people will.
Civic leaders, mayors, governors, CEOs, investors and the majority of the business community will take up this challenge. We are in the middle of a clean energy revolution that no single person or group can stop. President Trump’s decision is profoundly in conflict with what the majority of Americans want from our president; but no matter what he does, we will ensure that our inevitable transition to a clean energy economy continues.”
 

Al Gore (Photo credit: Climate Reality Project)

 
President Barack Obama
Barack Obama was, without question, the United States’ first Green-Sports president. Obama:

• Became the first U.S. chief executive to speak publicly about Green-Sports, when he lauded the National Hockey League and the Pittsburgh Penguins for their environmental efforts at an October, 2016 White House ceremony honoring the latter for winning the Stanley Cup.
• Issued a proclamation in support of the initial Green-Sports Day, on October 6, 2016.
• And the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy hosted the first Sports-Climate Change Roundtables

Plus Obama, now 56, still has a smooth, left-handed jump shot.
 

President Obama, driving to the basket during a pickup game with White House staffers at Martha’s Vineyard in August, 2009. (Photo credit: The White House/Pete Souza, official photographer)

 
The first Green-Sports President has largely stayed silent since leaving office. But I guess watching his successor begin the process of unraveling one his administration’s most important accomplishments was too much for Obama to take so he issued this statement:
“A year and a half ago, the world came together in Paris around the first-ever global agreement to set the world on a low-carbon course and protect the world we leave to our children.
It was steady, principled American leadership on the world stage that made that achievement possible. It was bold American ambition that encouraged dozens of other nations to set their sights higher as well. And what made that leadership and ambition possible was America’s private innovation and public investment in growing industries like wind and solar — industries that created some of the fastest new streams of good-paying jobs in recent years, and contributed to the longest streak of job creation in our history.

Simply put, the private sector already chose a low-carbon future. And for the nations that committed themselves to that future, the Paris Agreement opened the floodgates for businesses, scientists, and engineers to unleash high-tech, low-carbon investment and innovation on an unprecedented scale.
The nations that remain in the Paris Agreement will be the nations that reap the benefits in jobs and industries created. I believe the United States of America should be at the front of the pack. But even in the absence of American leadership; even as this Administration joins a small handful of nations that reject the future; I’m confident that our states, cities, and businesses will step up and do even more to lead the way, and help protect for future generations the one planet we’ve got.”
 
GreenSportsBlog
I wholeheartedly agree with the sentiments expressed by SandSI, Allen Hershkowitz in yesterday’s interview, POW, Vice President Gore and President Obama about President Trump’s #AmericaLast decision to pull the U.S out of the Paris Climate Agreement.
As far as the sports world is concerned, I will be interested to see if/when U.S. pro sports leagues/college conferences, teams, owners and athletes speak up on the Paris Exit. I hope I am wrong but I think POW will be the exception and many will stay on the sidelines, citing the desire to stay out of politics. Given the way sports got involved in the North Carolina bathroom bill and other issues, if politics becomes the excuse for staying silent, it would seem to be a disingenuous one. But we shall see; perhaps the leagues and teams will step up. GreenSportsBlog asked the major U.S. pro sports leagues, the USTA and the PAC-12 for comment. So far, the NFL and the PAC-12 declined comment; we’re waiting to hear back from the rest. We will relay any statements we receive to you.
Finally, since this is GreenSportsBlog, I will use a sports analogy to make my our statement:
In the “Global Affairs, Global Emissions and the Global Economy” game, businesses, nonprofits and individuals are the players. In this case of the Paris Climate Agreement, 195 national governments are the referees, steering the action of the game. In this Climate World Cup, the U.S. has the best team (scientists, cleantech innovators, companies, nonprofits). The U.S also is the head referee, a crucial and, in terms of leadership of the 21st century global economy, advantageous position to be in.
At least it was until yesterday.
Now the U.S. has sidelined itself as a referee, joining Syria and Nicaragua on the sidelines.
To be sure, as Vice President Gore, President Obama and many others have said, U.S. companies, governors, and mayors, academics and others will continue to play the game. And, per Allen Hershkowitz, sports federations and governing bodies will do so as well. But having the federal government step away from its important role will hurt the U.S. economically and diplomatically. Thankfully, we’re in the early stages of this crucial global game and most fans in the U.S. (71 percent in one poll) want their country to stay on as referee. My bet? Sooner or later, continued pressure from fans and the players will bring the U.S. federal government back into the game. So keep the pressure on.
 

^ Republican House members who are part of the Climate Solutions Caucus, including Carlos Curbelo (FL) and Patrick Meehan (PA), spoke out strongly against the decision to take the U.S out of the Paris Climate Agreement.

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