Trump visits California, Biden talks climate change as wildfires take
campaign focus
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[September 14, 2020]
By Jeff Mason and Trevor Hunnicutt
LAS VEGAS/WILMINGTON, Del. (Reuters) -
President Donald Trump will travel to California on Monday to be briefed
about its devastating wildfires while Democratic rival Joe Biden plans a
speech on the matter from Delaware, bringing climate change to the
forefront of the presidential campaign.
Trump, a Republican who pulled the United States out of the Paris accord
on global warming because he found it too costly, has expressed his view
that poor forest management is partly to blame for the fires that are
raging around the West Coast.
Democrats have emphasized that climate change has played a role, and
Biden is expected to emphasize that in his remarks.
Trump will travel to McClellan Park, California to meet with local and
federal officials for a briefing about the fires.
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"The president continues to support those who are battling raging
wildfires in a locally-executed, state-managed, and federally-supported
emergency response," White House spokesman Judd Deere said in a
statement on Saturday.
Biden has included climate change in his list of major crises facing the
United States, along with the coronavirus pandemic that has killed more
than 194,000 and pushed the country into an economic recession.
"Vice President Biden will discuss the threat that extreme weather
events pose to Americans everywhere, how they are both caused by and
underscore the urgent need to tackle the climate crisis, and why we need
to create good-paying, union jobs to build more resilient
infrastructure," his campaign said in a statement on Sunday.
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President Donald Trump rallies with supporters at a campaign event
in Henderson, Nevada, U.S. September 13, 2020. REUTERS/Jonathan
Ernst
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A spate of deadly and destructive wildfires has hit California,
Oregon and Washington this summer, destroying thousands of homes and
a handful of small towns, burning more than 4 million acres and
killing more than two dozen people since early August.
Fighting climate change is a key, motivating issue for young people
and progressive-leaning voters that Biden needs to turn out to vote
in the Nov. 3 election.
It is a more complicated issue for some Republicans, who, despite
clear scientific evidence of its existence, question the data and
the need for broad and expensive measures to fight it.
(Reporting by Jeff Mason; editing by Diane Craft)
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