[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 161 (2015), Part 14]
[Senate]
[Pages 19746-19747]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                    PARIS CLIMATE CHANGE CONFERENCE

  Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, this week the United Nations climate 
change conference is continuing in Paris. I understand over the weekend 
a number of Democrats went to Paris to watch a part of the discussion.
  I have been talking to folks back home in Wyoming about this climate 
conference and what the Democrats are proposing, and I will tell you, 
the people in Wyoming are not happy. They are not happy about President 
Obama's plan to destroy American energy jobs and also to destroy the 
communities that depend on these jobs.
  They are not happy about the President's plan to give away billions 
of U.S. taxpayer dollars to other countries. They are not happy about 
the President's plan to ignore the will of the American people and to 
sign an expensive, destructive treaty on climate change in Paris. That 
is what they think the President is planning to do, and I believe they 
are exactly right.
  Last Friday, the Foreign Relations subcommittee that I chair released 
a new report called ``Senate Outlook on United States International 
Strategy on Climate Change in Paris 2015,'' a new report on President 
Obama's plan to bypass Congress and transfer American taxpayer funds 
overseas. This report shows how President Obama is supporting an effort 
to bypass Congress and to sign a climate deal that gives money to 
developing nations.
  The subcommittee report found four things.
  First, the report says that the President is making false promises to 
other countries about his ability to meet his own greenhouse gas 
reduction targets. President Obama has promised to cut back American 
energy production dramatically. The administration is pushing 
powerplant regulations that will destroy jobs and make electricity more 
expensive and less reliable. Bipartisan majorities in Congress, in the 
House and in the Senate, have rejected these regulations. President 
Obama wants to use this international agreement to force new 
regulations on the American people.
  This administration has been doing all that it can to cripple 
American energy producers all across the country. It has piled new 
regulations on coal producers. It is blocking exports of American crude 
oil and liquefied natural gas. It set emission standards that are 
designed to put powerplants out of business, and that is the second 
thing that the report found--that the President's unrealistic targets 
and timetables for reducing targeted emissions are threatening jobs and 
threatening communities all across America.
  The third main point in this report is that the President is forcing 
American taxpayers to pay for it--to pay for our past economic 
successes through his contributions to the so-called Green Climate 
Fund. I did a townhall event the other day in Wyoming and asked what 
they thought about the President's plan of using their taxpayer dollars 
in this way, and 94 percent of the people in the townhall said they 
opposed President Obama's plan to send their hard-earned taxpayer 
dollars to the United Nations climate slush fund.
  President Obama doesn't care. He says he wants the money anyway. He 
knows American emissions have actually been declining over the last 
decade. He knows we are not the biggest source of carbon dioxide in the 
world. Far more emissions are coming from developing countries. We see 
it in China; we see it in India. Those countries say that if they are 
going to cut their emissions, if they are going to be part of President 
Obama's plan, somebody else is going to have to pay up. They expect 
developed countries such as the United States to foot the bill.
  How much money do they want? What are we talking about? So far, 
developing countries have said they want--the number is astonishing--at 
least $5.4 trillion--not million, not billion, but trillion. That is 
what 73 developing countries are demanding over the next 15 years. It 
doesn't even count another 90 developing countries that haven't made 
their demands public yet. The reality is a great deal of this money is 
going to end up lining the pockets of government officials in these 
developing countries. The American people know it. They see through it, 
even though the Obama administration will not admit it.
  That brings up the fourth thing that this report found. Our 
subcommittee found that the President plans to reach a climate change 
deal that ignores the American people and cuts them out of the process 
entirely. The American public doesn't want these policies. Congress has 
passed laws to change these policies. The Obama administration just 
goes on and on and makes the rules that it wants anyway. This 
administration refuses to have accountability to the American people.
  What are we talking about with regard to the money? It is interesting 
because just today, this morning from Paris, there is a report from the 
New York Times: ``U.S. Proposes Raising Spending on Climate-Change 
Adaptation.''
  Here is the byline from France:

       In an effort to help smooth the passage of a sweeping new 
     climate accord here this week, Secretary of State John Kerry 
     announced on Wednesday a proposal to double its grant-based 
     public finance for climate-change adaptation. . . . Mr. 
     Kerry's announcement came as the momentum toward a deal 
     appeared to have hit a momentary snag.

  Why? Well, reading further: ``The issue of money has been a crucial 
sticking point in the talks, as developing countries demand that richer 
countries open up their wallets. . . . ''
  So John Kerry is there to open up the wallet of the American 
taxpayers--because it is not his money--doubling what he is offering, 
to try to buy a solution that he wants to accomplish even though it is 
directly in opposition to the American public. This administration, 
President Obama and Secretary Kerry, are out of touch with the American 
people, who reject this expensive and destructive energy and climate 
policy.
  The Obama administration is also out of touch with the rest of the 
world. The Obama administration says that some parts of the agreement 
reached in

[[Page 19747]]

Paris will be legally binding and other parts will not because, 
obviously, we are the Congress. We are the elected representatives of 
the American people, and we have a say. So the President is saying that 
parts of the agreement are binding and parts are not. China says the 
whole thing is binding. The European Union says the entire thing is 
binding. Who is right? President Obama or the rest of the world?
  The Obama administration says it is going to give billions of our 
taxpayer dollars to these countries, including to a lot of countries 
that don't like us very much. That doesn't seem to matter to the 
President. The developing countries say they want trillions. John Kerry 
is in Paris today, doubling the amount of money, doubling to try to buy 
support for something the American people don't support.
  It is interesting because, if you think back just a couple of months, 
President Obama was frantic--desperate--to get a deal with Iran over 
its nuclear programs because of his legacy. He signed a terrible deal--
by all accounts, a terrible deal.
  Now he is doing it again. He is once again frantic, once again 
desperate, to get a climate deal in Paris. Why? Because of his so-
called legacy. He is planning once again to sign a terrible deal, and 
he has his Secretary of State, John Kerry, there giving the speeches 
and making promises that the American public will have to pay for if 
they get their way.
  Iran says it will play the Obama administration's game on emissions 
and reduce its carbon emissions as the President wants, but before it 
does, it expects the Obama administration to lift all of the remaining 
sanctions from the Iranian deal. It wants the United States and other 
countries to give them $840 billion over the next 15 years. That is 
what is at stake, and those are the things the President continues to 
give away as he surrenders our energy security, our energy reliability, 
our energy jobs--a surrender by the President. He is desperate for 
approval by the other countries when he should be focusing on the 
United States. He seems to want to promise any policy, pledge any 
amount of money to get it, but the American people oppose sending their 
money to a United Nations climate slush fund. As their elected 
representatives, Congress must not allow the President to continue to 
try to buy popularity for himself using American taxpayer dollars.
  Congress must not allow the President to use this meeting in Paris to 
advance his own legacy at the expense of the American people and the 
American economy.
  Thank you, Mr. President.

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