Bills
| 3.23.22

Should the U.S. Stay in the Paris Agreement? (H.R. 9)

Do you support or oppose this bill?

What is H.R. 9?

(Updated August 25, 2021)

This bill — the Climate Action Now Act — would prohibit the use of federal funds to take any action withdrawing the U.S. from the Paris Agreement (which is a non-binding agreement to limit increases in global temperature). It’d also call on the president to develop and publicize a plan for the U.S. to meet the pollution reduction goals it committed to at the Paris Agreement in 2015.

Argument in favor

The Paris Agreement is an important step towards addressing climate change. The U.S. needs to stay in the agreement, both to signal its own commitment towards addressing global warming and to ensure that other nations also make efforts to address climate change.

Argument opposed

The Paris Agreement doesn’t go far enough to address climate change, so staying in it won’t do much to slow climate change. This bill also has virtually no chance of becoming law, as Senate Republicans and President Trump won’t agree to its enactment.

Impact

Climate change; U.S. withdrawal from the Paris Agreement; Paris Agreement on climate change; and President Trump.

Cost of H.R. 9

Although costs to implement this bill’s provisions could vary significantly, CBO estimates that implementing this bill would cost around $1 million over the 2019-2024 period.

Additional Info

In-Depth: Rep. Kathy Castor (D-FL), Chair of the Select Committee on the Climate Crisis, introduced this bill to demand action on the climate crisis, ensure the U.S. honors its Paris Agreement commitments, and lay the groundwork for future action to address climate change:

“It was with America’s leadership and engagement that so many nations committed to climate action in the international Paris Agreement.  Despite what President Trump has said, America cannot and will not retreat. We will keep our commitments to fight the climate crisis. This is just the start of action by House Democrats in this Congress. We can create millions of good-paying clean energy jobs right now. We can save billions of dollars in energy costs for working people right now.  We can finally address decades of environmental injustice right now. And we can respond to the incredible groundswell of activism from young people who are demanding climate action now as well. They are the first generation to grow up in the climate crisis. Now they are demanding the chance to be the generation that solves it. Speaking as a Floridian who boarded up and fled my home with my family as Hurricane Irma spun its destructive winds and storm surge towards my hometown a year and a half ago, I understand we must act with urgency on the climate crisis. The Climate Action Now Act will help us carry out our moral obligation to future generations to tackle this crisis now.”

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) says climate change is a “caucus-wide priority” for Democrats, and calls this bill “only step one” in the Democratic party’s efforts to address climate change in the 116th Congress. In remarks at this bill’s introduction, she expressed her caucus’ support, emphasizing the jobs that’ll be created by addressing climate change and arguing that there’s a moral imperative to address climate change:

“[C]limate crisis is an existential threat of our generation, of our time, a crisis manifested in natural disasters of epic proportions. Today, the House Democratic Majority is honoring the will of the people and taking first strong steps to protect our planet and our future. The bill – this is about jobs. It’s about good-paying green jobs.  It’s about advancing our economy and our global preeminence in green technology. It’s about health, it’s about public health and clean air and clean water for our children. It’s about defending our national security. The evidence is clear. The national security experts have spoken. This is a national security issue. And for many of us, it’s a moral issue.  If you do believe, as I do, that this is God’s creation, this planet, we have a moral responsibility to be good stewards of it. But even if you don’t subscribe to that, you know we have a moral responsibility to future generations to pass on this planet in a responsible, responsible way.”

House Majority Rep. Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) expressed his support for this bill upon its introduction: 

“While the President and Republicans continue to deny that our climate is changing and that human activity is responsible, Democrats refuse to sit on the sidelines.  Our bill would restore America’s standing in the global fight against climate change and address the threats to public health and our economy posed by rising sea levels, wildfires, and a greater frequency of deadly storms.”

House Republicans expressed opposition to this bill, arguing that Democrats avoided incorporating ideas from the other side of the aisle that could garner bipartisan support. As House Energy & Commerce Ranking Member Greg Walden (R-OR) described in the bill's committee report:

"Indeed, the Majority rejected every Minority amendment offered at markup, including amendments that sought to protect consumers from energy-price impacts, that sought to ensure that any planning include essential clean technologies like nuclear and hydropower, that sought to ensure the continued global emissions benefits of the nation’s natural gas exports, and that sought to ensure that the United States not bind itself to commitments that put it at a strategic disadvantage to China or Russia, which have gamely avoided economically harmful climate policies. As it is, we cannot support favorably reporting this bill to the House floor.”

This bill passed the House Energy and Commerce Committee by a 29-19 vote and the House Foreign Affairs Committee by a 24-16 vote with the support of 210 Democratic cosponsors. It has the support of Ceres, the Sierra Club, the League of Conservation Voters, and the Center for American Progress.


Of Note: The 2015 Paris Agreement is a nonbinding agreement that aims to limit the increase in global temperature to well below 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. In signing it, the Obama administration pledged to cut emissions to 26-28 percent below 2005 levels by 2025.

However, since the Paris accord wasn’t ratified by the Senate as a treaty, the president has unilateral authority to pull out of it. Thus, in June 2017, President Trump announced his intention to withdraw the U.S. from the Paris Agreement (which can’t formally happen until 2020), arguing that it threatens the economic prosperity of the U.S.:

"The Paris Accord would undermine our economy, hamstring our workers, weaken our sovereignty, impose unacceptable legal risks, and put us at permanent disadvantage to the other countries of the world."

Rep. Castor’s office notes that over 2,000 businesses and investors, 280 cities and counties, and 10 states have independently pledged to meet the U.S. commitment under the Paris climate agreement. As of March 27, 2019, “We Are Still In,” a coalition co-founded by Ceres and several partner organizations in the weeks following the Trump administration’s announcement of its intention to leave the Paris climate agreement, boasts 3,600 signatories, including governors, mayors, tribes, businesses, investors, faith organizations, colleges and universities, and represents over half of all Americans and $6.2 trillion of the U.S. economy.

Climate experts have said that the Paris Agreement doesn’t go far enough to mitigate global warming’s effects — they argue that far more dramatic action is needed from the U.S. and other nations.


Media:

Summary by Lorelei Yang

(Photo Credit: iStockphoto.com / baona)