Until January, Podesta was President Joe Biden's senior point person on international climate policy. He took the stand Tuesday in Missoula, Montana, as an expert witness in Lighthiser v. Trump, a youth-led case challenging the administration's fossil-fuel agenda.
Trump's second term has seen sweeping rollbacks of domestic policy aimed at fighting climate change, and an effort to push fossil fuels abroad -- from embedding liquefied natural gas (LNG) purchases in trade deals to reportedly pressuring bodies such as the International Energy Agency.
With COP30 talks in Brazil fast approaching, Podesta spoke to AFP in Missoula about America's retreat from climate leadership -- and what it means for the planet and US influence.
Q: How do you view the Trump administration's international posture on climate?
Podesta: In the first term, they decided to abandon leadership. Now they're trying to lead the world in the wrong direction. In international forums they're trying to prevent climate action; in bilateral relationships they're promoting fossil fuels, and in multilateral fora they're showing disdain for any common action.
Q: There's talk they could even try to weaken UN consensus on climate change. How much damage can they do?
Podesta: They'll do all they can to tilt the field towards favoring fossil fuels. Their reasoning for going after science in the US will find its way into undermining the consensus science abroad. Whether they can actually change the dynamic at the IPCC (the UN climate science panel), particularly given they're withdrawing resources from the IPCC and forbidding US federal scientists from participating in studies -- I don't think they'll have much effect on the overall production of peer-reviewed science, but they'll cause a little havoc along the way.
Q: How does this posture affect US standing in the world, especially against China's push to dominate clean energy?
Podesta: It certainly reduces the sense of solidarity we have with countries that are not China. If we're in a great competition with China for global leadership, we're aligning with Russia and Saudi Arabia instead of with our natural allies in Europe, Latin America, and Asia. From a security posture, it's a terrible mistake.
Q: What will all this mean for COP30 talks in Brazil?
Podesta: We'll see this play out in Belem and beyond. There's still strong global consensus to move forward, but with the US not just absent from leadership but playing a revisionist role, it empowers countries like Saudi Arabia and Russia that are trying to water down ambition -- and now they have a strong ally in doing that.
Q: What do you think motivates Trump's approach?
Podesta: It's a mix of trying to turn clean energy into a culture-war issue while ignoring the real economics of the transition, and his fealty to fossil fuel interests that have funded his rise. But a lot of it is the politics of culture war - as long as he thinks it works for him, he'll keep pursuing it.
Q: What differentiates the Lighthiser case from Juliana, a previous federal youth-led climate case, which you helped oppose when you were part of the Biden administration?
Podesta: I do think it's different from Juliana because they're seeking some specific remedies against direct harm that's the result of actions taken by this administration. It's showing in dramatic terms what taking these actions today builds in harms tomorrow, and that can only come through the voices of these young people, and I thought they were moving in the testimony they gave... It's their future that's at stake in this.
Judge weighs court's powers in Trump climate case
Missoula, United States (AFP) Sept 18, 2025 -
A federal judge overseeing a closely watched climate case on Wednesday pressed the lawyer representing young Americans suing President Donald Trump on whether courts have constitutional authority to rein in his fossil-fuel agenda.
On the second and last day of hearings in Missoula, Montana, attorneys delivered final arguments in Lighthiser v. Trump, part of a growing global wave of lawsuits seeking to force climate action amid political inertia or hostility.
The 22 plaintiffs, represented by the nonprofit Our Children's Trust, want a preliminary injunction against three executive orders they say trample their inalieanable rights by seeking to "unleash" fossil fuel development while sidelining renewable energy.
They also accuse the administration of eroding federal climate science, leaving the public less informed about mounting dangers.
The government counters that the lawsuit is undemocratic and echoes Juliana v. United States, a similar youth-led case that wound through the courts for nearly a decade before the Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal last year -- and should be similarly dismissed.
"This case asks whether the United States Constitution guards against executive abuses of power by executive orders that deprive children and youth of their fundamental rights to life and liberties," said Julia Olson, director of Our Children's Trust and the lead lawyer.
"And now that the court has had the opportunity to hear from some of the youth plaintiffs and their expert witnesses, the answer to that question is clear, and it's yes," she said.
But Judge Dana Christensen, who has issued favorable environmental rulings in the past, pressed Olson on whether precedent tied his hands, and asked if granting relief would require him to oversee every subsequent climate action taken by the executive branch.
"What exactly does that look like?" he asked. "I'd be required to continue to monitor the actions of this administration to determine whether or not they are acting in a manner that contravenes my injunction."
- Decision awaited -
Olson argued the case fundamentally differs from Juliana, which sought to upend decades of federal energy policy, while Lighthiser targets only three orders. She urged the court to take inspiration from Brown v. Board of Education, the 1954 ruling that dismantled racial segregation in schools.
Government attorney Michael Sawyer questioned whether the plaintiffs' own choices undermined their claims of injury, pointing to the flights college student Avery McRae takes from her home state Oregon to Florida.
"If she's injured by every additional ton of emissions, why are those emissions allowed to proceed," Sawyer said, "but the emissions that put dinner on the table of a coal miner's family not allowed?"
The fate of the case -- whether it moves toward trial following a preliminary injunction or is tossed out entirely -- may not be clear for weeks or longer.
Michael Gerrard, an environmental law professor at Columbia Law School, told AFP the plaintiffs had made "a strong factual case about the causes and dangers of climate change."
But he added: "It would be plowing new ground for a court to say that there is a substantive due process right under the US Constitution to a stable climate system."
- 'Shouldn't have to miss school' -
Throughout the hearings, plaintiffs presented experts and firsthand accounts of intensifying heat and ever more destructive climate disasters. The government called no witnesses of its own.
Lori Byron, a pediatrician and co-author of government reports, testified children are "uniquely and disproportionately" harmed by climate change because of their developing bodies and dependence on adults.
Energy economist Geoffrey Heal of Columbia University rejected the administration's claim that the country faces an "energy emergency," the legal justification for Trump's orders.
"The evidence of that is when you go to a light switch and flick it the light comes on," he said.
And 17-year-old Isaiah H. of Missoula, an aspiring cross-country runner, described how worsening fires and shrinking snowpack are reducing his ability to ski, run, and spend time outside.
Isaiah recalled how he and his brother once evacuated their house "because the smoke was too bad."
"I shouldn't be having to step in like this, and shouldn't have to miss school and make up tests and assignments just to advocate for my health and safety."
Young plaintiffs stand tall after taking on Trump climate agenda in court
Missoula, United States (AFP) Sept 19, 2025 -
Young Americans challenging President Donald Trump's fossil fuel agenda say they were proud to have their day in court -- even if it meant fielding tough, sometimes perplexing questions from government lawyers.
"I don't think the gravity of that situation has permeated through my brain yet," 19-year-old Joseph Lee told AFP at the close of a two-day hearing in Lighthiser v. Trump.
"I'm going to wake up and realize, 'Wow, I really did that.' I testified in court against my own federal government, and it's just such a meaningful thing to be part of this process."
The case challenges three executive orders that the plaintiffs say trample their inalienable rights to life and liberty by seeking to "unleash" fossil fuels while sidelining sources of renewable energy.
The plaintiffs also seek to reverse the administration's dismantling of climate science -- from suppressing a key national climate report to proposing to shut down a critical carbon dioxide monitoring site in Hawaii.
Judge Dana Christensen is now weighing whether to grant a preliminary injunction that could pave the way to trial -- or throw the case out, as the government has urged.
- 'It's not about ACs' -
Despite the gravity of the issues at the center of the case, the plaintiffs said they found themselves questioning the seemingly insignificant details raised in court.
Lee, from California, testified that a case of heat stroke left him hospitalized on the brink of organ failure.
During cross-examination, Justice Department attorney Erik Van Der Stouwe asked whether he had sued the University of California, San Diego over its lack of air conditioning in dorms, implying that -- and not climate change -- was the remedy.
"It's not about ACs," Lee later told AFP.
"Minimizing it to something as trivial just goes to show" that the government's case lacks merit, he added.
At another point, Van Der Stouwe questioned whether Lee could prove Trump's climate cuts cost him opportunities to gain a research position at university -- even though a university-wide letter, entered into evidence, explicitly cited the executive actions for reducing such positions.
When pressed on how he could be certain, Lee replied that as a student he lacked the power to investigate the matter beyond all doubt.
"But you did have the capacity to investigate the government's executive orders?" the lawyer shot back.
Lee responded he had the ability to read their plain language -- a remark that drew murmurs of approval from the packed and supportive courtroom.
- 'Really empowering' -
In another strange exchange, 20-year-old Avery McRae of Oregon was asked whether the anxiety she linked to climate change might stem from having spent half her life suing the federal government.
And when 17-year-old Jorja McCormick of Livingston, Montana took the stand, she recalled the day a firefighter knocked on her family's door and ordered them to evacuate as flames closed in, a moment, she said, that left her traumatized and that harmed her family's health.
Under cross examination, government attorney Miranda Jensen asked: "You just testified you have three horses, right? You're aware that raising horses contributes to global warming?"
Speaking after the hearings wrapped up, McCormick said she had mulled over the exchange.
"There's coal trains going through my downtown every day," spewing toxic dust, she told AFP.
"So I think my horses being out on open property minding their own business compared to coal trains hurting the entire community is quite different."
Despite the grilling, McCormick described testifying as cathartic.
"Being on the stand was really empowering -- telling my story, getting it out into the world like that was almost healing."
Whatever the outcome of Lighthiser v. Trump, she said she plans to continue her activism.
"A better future is possible," added Lee. "If a decision isn't favorable, we'll keep fighting."
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