Trump takes victory lap after biggest climate rollback yet

(Daniel Bush – BBC) US President Donald Trump framed his sweeping rollback of federal climate change policy on Thursday as a political win over the Democratic Party’s “radical” environmental agenda, reprising a message Republicans have used in past elections and could turn to once again ahead of November’s crucial midterms. His announcement at the White House was one of the most significant moves of his second term in office. The president said he was revoking an Obama-era “endangerment finding” from 2009 which held that pollution harms public health and the environment. For almost 17 years, the US has used that scientific finding as the legal basis to establish policies to reduce emissions from cars, power plants and other sources of planet-warming gases. “This radical rule became the legal foundation for the Green New Scam,” Trump said, using a term popular with Republicans for describing Democratic environmental and climate policies. The move marks the culmination of a decade-long push by Trump to tear up policies that Democrats and many climate experts say are needed to rein in emissions. And it is one of the most far-reaching reversals of American climate policy yet. – Analysis: Trump takes victory lap after biggest climate rollback yet