ウィスパリング同時通訳研究会コミュのJen Psaki holds White House press briefing | 1/27/2021

kJen Psaki: (00:00)
I have to give you a fancy introduction. Good afternoon. President Biden is continuing to follow through on his key promise to take swift and bold action that addresses the climate crisis, building on his day one actions of rejoining the Paris Agreement and strengthening our clean air and water protections and holding polluters accountable. Today, he will take executive action to tackle the climate crisis at home and abroad while creating good paying union jobs, building sustainable infrastructure, and delivering environmental justice.
(00:41)
I’m thrilled today as a part of our effort to bring policy experts into the briefing room, we’re joined by two very special guests who are going to talk to you all about today’s executive orders and take a few questions as well. And I will as always play the role of bad cop when they have to go. National Climate Advisor, Gina McCarthy, and Special Presidential Envoy for Climate and my former boss, Former Secretary of State, John Kerry. And a big day for Boston in the briefing room. With that, go ahead.

Gina McCarthy: (01:09)
Thank you. It’s a big day for Boston every day. Thank you everybody. Today, President Biden will build on the actions he took on day one and he’ll take more steps to fulfill commitments he made to tackle the climate crisis while creating good paying union jobs and achieving environmental justice. In his campaign, he and Vice President Harris put forward the most ambitious climate vision that any presidential ticket had ever embraced, and he spent more time campaigning on climate than we have ever seen. The president also has consistently identified the climate crisis as one of four interrelated existential crises that are gripping our nation all at once. And he’s demanding answers that can address all four. And he’s not waiting to take action, getting us started on his first day in office because science is telling us that we don’t have a moment to lose to fight against all four of these crisises in a way that recognizes their intersectionality.
(02:21)
He’s already committed the US to reenter the Paris Climate Agreement. And he committed us as well to start undoing the assault on our environment that has occurred over the past four years. And he is now taking additional action to really target the challenge of climate change. So today for me is a very good day. Just one week into it his administration, President Biden is continuing to move us forward at the breadth and the pace that climate science demands. Today’s executive order starts by saying, “It is the policy of this administration. That climate considerations shall be an essential element of US foreign policy and national security.”
(03:11)
That’s where the big guy comes in. It gives my colleague, John Kerry, the first ever International Climate Envoy, the authority to really drive forward a process that will restore American leadership on climate throughout the world. And you will see in him more about that from Secretary Kerry. But here at home, we have to do our part, or we will not be able to make the kind of worldwide change that climate change demands. So this executive order establishes a White House Office of Domestic Climate Policy, and it directs everyone who works for the president to use every tool available at our disposal to solve the climate crisis, because we’re going to take a whole of government approach. We’re going to power our economy with clean energy.(04:06)
We’re going to do that in a way that will produce millions of American jobs that are going to be good paying, that are going to be jobs that have the opportunity for workers to join a union. Because as President Biden has often told us, when he thinks of climate change, his first thought is about jobs. And it should be because people in this country need a job. And this is about making that happen in the most creative insignificant way that the federal government can move forward. (04:41)
And we’re going to make sure that nobody is left behind, and I’m not just talking about communities in terms of environmental justice, but workers as well. This order takes historic strides to address environmental injustice. It creates both a White House inter-agency task force to address environmental justice, as well as an advisory council. It directs the Department of Health and Human Services to create an office of Climate Change and Health Equity, because after all, climate change is the most significant public health challenge of our time. And it tasks the Department of Justice with establishing an Office of Climate Justice, because we know the communities who are being hurt and we know we have to start enforcing the standards today in ensuring that they are part of the solution and in places that we can invest.
(05:33)
In fact, it commits 40% of our investment in clean energy towards disadvantaged communities so they can benefit from the new jobs that are available and see that better future. President Biden’s order establishes a working group on coal and power plant communities, because we have to make sure that in this transition, every agency in government is using every tool at their disposal to drive resources to those communities. And it fulfills longstanding commitments to leverage our vast natural resources to contribute to our clean energy future. It places a pause and review on new oil and gas leases on federal public lands and waters consistent with a promise President Biden has repeatedly made and has been very clear in the face of efforts to distort his promise. And it sets a goal of doubling offshore wind production by 2030. In addition, he plans to sign a presidential memorandum that aims to restore scientific integrity across the federal government and earn back the public’s trust, making a commitment to base solutions on the best available science and data. (06:53)
So today is a very big day for science and for our efforts to power our economy with good paying union jobs. Thank you very much.

John Kerry: (07:11)
Good afternoon, everybody. It’s great to be here. Let me say, first of all, what a pleasure it is to be here with Gina. I’m a big fan of Gina’s. Gina and I worked very, very closely together during the campaign when we sat down to bring the Bernie Sanders folks together around the Biden climate plan, and she is the perfect person to be tackling the domestic side of this equation, which is complicated. And nobody knows the details better than she does and nobody’s going to be more effective at corralling everybody to move in the same direction.
(07:56)
It’s also an enormous pleasure for me to be here with Jen Psaki. She mentioned that, nobody was her boss, but I had the privilege of working with her. And seven years ago, we gathered in the state department briefing room. She’s traded up, obviously, but she has not given away any of her fundamental principles and commitment to telling you all the truth, telling the American people the truth and doing so with great candor and transparency. And I’m very happy to be here with her.
(08:32)
The stakes on climate change just simply couldn’t be any higher than they are right now. It is existential. We use that word too easily. We throw it away. But we have a big agenda in front of us on a global basis. And President Biden is deeply committed, totally seized by this issue, as you can tell by this executive order and by the initiative of getting back into Paris immediately. That’s why he rejoined the Paris Agreement so quickly because he knows it is urgent.
(09:08)
He also knows that Paris alone is not enough, not when almost 90% of all of the planet’s global emissions come from outside of US borders. We could go to zero tomorrow and the problem isn’t solved. So that’s why today, one week into the job, President Biden will sign this additional executive set of orders to help move us down the road, ensuring that ambitious climate action is global in scope and scale, as well as national here at home.
(09:46)
Today in the order that he will sign that Gina has described to you, he makes climate central to foreign policy planning, to diplomacy, and to national security preparedness. It creates new platforms to coordinate climate action across the federal agencies and departments, sorely needed. And most importantly, it commissions a national intelligence estimate on the security implications of climate change to give all of us an even deeper understanding of the challenge. This is the first time a president has ever done that. And our 17 intelligence agencies are going to come together and assess exactly what the danger and damage and potential risks are.
(10:34)
The order directs the State Department to prepare a transmittal package seeking Senate advice and consent on the Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol, an amendment that by itself, if ratified and fully enforced globally, could hold the Earth’s temperature by 0.5 of an entire degree, not insignificant. And it sets forth a process for us to develop an ambitious new Paris target, as well as a US climate finance plan, both of which are essential to our being able to bring countries of the world together to raise ambition and meet this moment when we go to Glasgow for the follow-on agreement to Paris.
(11:18)
So that’s the only way for the world to succeed together, my friends. Again, this is an issue where failure literally is not an option. As he committed to doing on the campaign trail, the president is announcing that he will host a leader’s summit on climate change less than three months from now, on April 22nd, Earth Day, which will include a leader level reconvening of the major economies forum. We’ll have specifics to lay out over time, but the convening of this summit is essential to ensuring that 2021 is going to be the year that really makes up for the lost time of the last four years and that the UN climate conference, COP26 as it’s called, which the UK is hosting in November, to make sure that it is an unqualified success.
(12:15)
The road to Glasgow will be marked not just by promises, but by progress at a pace that we can all be proud of. And Gina is going to be putting her efforts in to making certain that that is true. The world will measure us by what we can do here at home. So with these executive actions today, we believe we’re steps further down that journey. Thank you.

Speaker 1: (12:41)All right. Let’s start with Nancy.
Nancy: (12:45)
Thank you so much. Secretary Kerry, a question for you, and then for Administrator McCarthy. You talked about the fact that it won’t really matter what we do very much if the rest of the world doesn’t do the same thing, but the US has had a fairly Rocky relationship with China recently. How do you plan to try to bring both China and India to the table on this issue?

John Kerry: (13:07)
Well, before I answer that, let me just say that the issue of making a difference, IE what we do at home, what I’m saying is you can’t solve the problem alone, but our doing things makes an enormous difference. What Gina succeeds in pulling together is essential to our ability to have credibility in the world. Now, with respect to China, obviously we have serious differences with China. Some very, very important issues. And I am as mindful of that as anybody having served as Secretary of State and in the Senate. The issues of theft of intellectual property and access to market, South China Sea. I mean, run the list. We all know them. Those issues will never be traded for anything that has to do with climate. That’s not-
(14:03)
… be traded for anything that has to do with climate. That’s not going to happen. But climate is a critical standalone issue that we have to deal on in the sense that China is 30% of the emissions of the world, we’re about 15% of the emissions of the world. You add the EU to that, and you’ve got three entities that are more than 55% or so. So it’s urgent that we find a way to compartmentalize, to move forward and we’ll wait and see. But President Biden is very, very clear about the need to address the other issues with China. And I know some people have been concerned, nothing is going to be siphoned off into one area from another.

Speaker 2: (14:47)
And then a question for either of you on coal, your executive order talks about oil and gas on federal lands, but it doesn’t really say much about coal. What is this administration’s policy when it comes to coal?

Gina McCarthy: (15:00)
Well, in terms of the oil and gas decision, is to make sure that we take a little pause and review the entire strategy of how we’re looking at public lands. So it will include looking at what new leases ought to be approved and sold. It’s looking at our ability also to look at coal in that mix. So the program review is going to look at how we manage public lands, consistent with climate, but also consistent with the marriage between climate and really growing jobs of the future. So it will be in the mix to be looked at, but it is not at this point included. It was not part of the commitments on the campaign, but we’re going to take a close look at all of it. And can I just add on your comment about China, which I’m not going to speak to the international dynamic, but I am going to say that part of the challenge that we face here is a challenge that President Biden has already started to address with his buy America pledge.
(15:57)
We have to start not just shifting to clean energy, but it has to be manufactured in the United States of America, not in other countries. And there is going to be a large discussion about how we make sure that a lot of the investment is about building up on manufacturing base again. That’s great jobs, that’s often hopefully union jobs, but it is also a wonderful opportunity for us to recoup the benefits of that manufacturing and lower the cost of clean energy. Part of the way we’re going to get there is by making sure the federal government buys American and that the federal government looks at its procurement across every agency so that the breadth of what we spend is spent designed to advance job growth in the United States, to advance health benefits for environmental justice communities, and to begin to tackle the very challenge, the existential challenge of climate change.

Speaker 3: (16:56)Jeff Mason.
Jeff Mason: (16:58)
Thank you. Jeff Mason with Reuters. Question for both of you. Can you give us a sense of when you expect to have the so-called NDC or US target for cutting greenhouse gas emissions as part of the Paris Accord? And can you also give us a sense of how ambitious you plan to make that number? Will it be 40%, 50%, higher than that?
John Kerry: (17:23)We’re united in this.

Gina McCarthy: (17:25)
I’m the dude who’s supposed to deliver this in a timely way and he sets the timing. So basically we want to make sure that the NDC is something that can be announced before the summit on earth day. And so we’re going to be out of the gate working with the agencies to see what kind of reductions and mitigation opportunities there are. And also again, to look at our public lands, to make sure that we can continue to store carbon in our soil, to work with agriculture and others, to look at how we better manage our forest so we’re not seeing the devastating forest fires that we’ve been having before. So all across the federal government, every agency, and you’ll see many of them specifically tasked in this executive order will participate in the task force that we’re going to have to actually develop the most aggressive NDC that we can to deliver the kind of boost that Secretary Kerry is looking for to be able to ensure that our international efforts are robust and sufficient to address the challenge internationally.

Jeff Mason: (18:34)
And just to follow up on that perhaps for Secretary Kerry, how do you assure international partners that the US will stick to whatever you propose after having seen the Trump administration take the US out of the Paris Accord?

John Kerry: (18:49)
Well, that’s precisely why we’re going to stick by it. And I think our word is strong. I’ve been on the phone for the last few days, talking to our allies in Europe, elsewhere around the world, and they are welcoming us back. They know that this administration already had a significant part of what will bring us to Glasgow, which was the Paris Agreement. The Obama, Biden administration had great credibility on this issue. And having President Biden be the person now who is driving this forward is enormously meaningful to the folks there. And they also know that I was deeply involved in the negotiations in Paris and I’m now asked by the president, by President Biden, to make certain that we do the same in Glasgow, if not more. So I have had no one question our credibility at this point in time, someone probably will.
(19:48)
And the answer will be that I think we can achieve things in the course of the next four years that will move the marketplace, the private sector, global finance, innovation and research, that in fact no one, no political person in the future would be able to undo what the planet is going to be organizing over these next months and years. This is the start of something new. I don’t know if you’ve read Larry Fink’s letter of BlackRock the other day, yesterday, but there’s a new awareness among major asset managers, commercial banks and others about the need to be putting resources into this endeavor because it is major in investment demand.
(20:37)
So I think the proof will be in what we do. Neither, Gina, nor I are going to start throwing around a lot of big promises, but you heard what she just said, and we will work very closely because we’re going to try to bring to the table to help inform her and the folks she’s working with, what we’re picking up abroad and what people are doing abroad and the steps that they’re taking and how we now have to measure ourselves against them, and they will measure themselves against us. We are well aware of that. [crosstalk 00:21:08]

Gina McCarthy: (21:08)
Let me just add something. I just want to call attention to the fact that cities and states have really picked up the initiative to move forward on clean energy, because the solutions are cheap. The solutions compete effectively against fossil fuels. We are talking about solutions that we’re not asking anybody to sacrifice, but add to their advantage. And if you look at the record over the past four years, while the prior administration might’ve wanted clean energy to head in a different direction, it’s gone faster and farther than anyone ever expected. And the idea that we could, with this new work that we’re doing together, send signals to the marketplace who are purchasing at the federal level and are re-looking at different ways of having on the ground change, we can build that demand. We can actually grow significantly millions of clean energy jobs. And all of a sudden the question won’t be whether the private sector’s going to buy into it, the private sector’s going to drive it. And so this is going to be a signal setter, the way the federal government ought to set on what our values are, what we think the future needs to be. And this is a value laden effort that President Biden has undertaken with full knowledge that it’s going to benefit jobs, it’s going to benefit our health and it’s going to lead to that future we want to hand to our child.