California governor talks climate change in China
BEIJING — Gov. Jerry Brown of California should be fading quietly into the final days of his career. After 40 years in public life, Brown, 79, a Democrat, is in the final stretch as the state’s chief executive. He has been talking about the Colusa County family ranch where he wants to retire. And a battery of younger politicians is already battling to succeed him.
But instead, Brown was in China on Tuesday, emerging as a de facto envoy from the United States on climate change at a time when President Donald Trump has renounced efforts to battle global emissions. In a meeting packed with symbolism — and one that seemed at once to elevate the California governor and rebuke Trump — President Xi Jinping of China met with Brown, at the governor’s request, at the very moment China prepares to take a more commanding role in fighting climate change.
“California’s leading, China’s leading,” Brown said at a wide-ranging, and at times feisty, news conference after he met with Xi. “It’s true I didn’t come to Washington, I came to Beijing. Well, someday I’m going to go to Washington, but not this week.”
Brown has long used his platform as governor to advocate for emission reduction policies, both in his own state and globally. But the decision by Trump to withdraw from the Paris climate agreement, on the eve of Brown’s trip here, gave an already planned visit new visibility.
The son of a governor, Brown has been in public office — or running for public office — nearly every year since he was elected secretary of state in 1970. This is the second time he has served as governor of the state. He ran for president three times. He has been mayor of Oakland, the chairman of the California Democratic Party and the state’s attorney general.
But the election of Trump, and his decision to pull out of the climate accord last week, suggests that Brown’s likely final act in public life is going to be much different from he ever imagined. Instead of fighting, to name one example, for the high-speed rail line between Los Angeles and San Francisco that has been his mission for more than five years — or guarding against what he sees as financial excesses by the state Legislature as it adopts its next budget — Brown, with 18 months left in office, has stepped into a void left by Trump.
In so doing, he has moved way beyond the stage of Sacramento, embracing an issue that he has been identified with since he first ran for governor and in a state that is known for championing environmental causes.
“I’m more energized and activated than ever,” Brown said, as he finished the third day of his trip. “And I think that we’re actually making more progress.”
Still, California’s confrontations with the Trump administration on climate change are risky: The state has been wary that the Environmental Protection Agency may move to revoke a waiver permitting California to set fuel economy standards that exceed federal requirements. That waiver, which has been central to the state’s success at reducing emissions, was issued when Richard M. Nixon was president. If it were revoked, the state would be forced to lower its strict fuel economy standards and it would be less able to influence national environmental policy.
For Xi, Brown’s visit could not have been better timed — allowing him to act on declarations that China would now become a global leader on climate change.
It is unusual for a Chinese president to meet with an American governor in such a formal setting in Beijing. His session with Brown was covered extensively by the government-controlled news media. The state broadcaster featured it as the second story on the evening news, after a feature on China’s ambitions in outer space, an indication of the meeting’s importance to the ruling Communist Party.