Trump tried to block key report on climate

The National Climate Assessment, America’s premier contribution to climate knowledge, stands out for many reasons. Hundreds of scientists across the federal government and academia join forces to compile the best insights available on climate change. The results, released just twice a decade or so, shape years of government decisions.

Now, as the clock runs down on President Donald Trump’s time in office, the climate assessment has gained a new distinction: It is one of the few major U.S. climate initiatives that his administration tried, yet largely failed, to undermine.

How the Trump White House attempted to put its mark on the report, and why those efforts stumbled, demonstrates the resilience of federal climate science despite the administration’s haphazard efforts to impede it.

In November, the administration removed the person responsible for the next edition of the report and replaced him with someone who has downplayed climate science, though at this point it seems to be too little, too late. But the efforts started back in 2018, when officials pushed out a top official and leaned on scientists to soften their conclusions — the scientists refused — and then later tried to bury the report, which did not work either.

“Thank God they didn’t know how to run a government,” said Thomas Armstrong, who during the Obama administration led the U.S. Global Change Research Program, which produces the assessment. “It could have been a lot worse.”

What makes the failure to impede the climate assessment remarkable is that Trump has made it a top priority to undercut efforts to address climate change. And on most fronts, he succeeded, reversing scores of environmental rules, relaxing restrictions on air pollution, and opening new land to oil and gas drilling.

The national assessment enjoys unique prominence, pulling together the work of scientists across the federal government. The law requires a new one every four years.

For Trump, who has called climate change a hoax, the assessment posed a particular challenge. Trying to politicize or dismiss climate science is one thing when the warnings come from Democrats or academics. But this report comes from his administration’s very own agencies.

This year, the White House turned its attention to the climate assessment again.

An important step in creating each new version is the call for authors, who shape the tone of the report. That notice, which typically also provides an outline of what topics will be covered, was delayed for months by the Trump administration, according to several people familiar with the decision. And when it was finally released in October, the language had been changed: Political appointees had removed information about the specific topics to be addressed.

Federal scientists worried the change signaled a plan to truncate the scope of the assessment — allowing the administration to meet the letter of the law while avoiding topics that might run counter to what the White House wanted to hear.

The White House spokesperson said “the organization of information into specific chapters remains a work in progress.”