Trump’s Election:
A Planetary Environmental Emergency
Inside Climate News

Dear Inside Climate News Reader,
There’s no mincing words: the re-election of Donald Trump will accelerate the planetary environmental emergency we call climate change; also the related modern mass extinction of species we call biodiversity loss; and the uncontrolled proliferation of toxic chemicals and plastics in the environment which we call pollution. Almost all of it is the collateral damage of hydrocarbon energy prosperity.

These are not partisan speculations. They are sober assessments of the environmental consequences that will flow from the actions and policies that the President-elect has already started to put into motion.

Have voters given him a mandate to speed up the destruction of the natural world? It’s not a question any pollster thought to ask, but it’s unlikely it’s what Americans want.

Our small nonprofit newsroom is the oldest and largest one of its kind in the nation. Now added responsibility has descended on our shoulders — we are a staff of only 36 people – even as we brace for assaults on the press freedoms that allow us to do our jobs.

The environmental journalist is a relatively recent arrival to the free press. We date back roughly sixty years to the epoch of Rachel Carson, whose books and scientific research pointed to the unequivocal need for watchdogs to protect the natural world. Ever since, our kind has been working to sniff out human insults to the environment, because our health, our lives and the fate of future generations depend on it.

Since our founding in 2007, it’s been our mission to fill gaps in climate and environmental coverage; or to put it another way, to break silences – the daily and perennial work of journalism. Over the years we have spent a lot of our time exposing environmental injustices, fraudulent misinformation and the many bad actors who perpetuate both; holding recalcitrant polluters and pliant regulators accountable; scrutinizing solutions and directly provoking, thanks to words we have written, the substantial reduction of planet-warming emissions.

In 2018 we began opening bureaus around the country and have built ICN Local. Our journalists are on the ground now in Texas and Alabama, North Carolina and Pennsylvania, Wyoming and Arizona – the list goes on.

It means we are well-positioned to be reporting from the places where the story of climate progress will be written, even as we watchdog the federal demolition of climate policy and environmental protection inside the Beltway. Compared to the last time Trump took office, there are more Democratic governors (23 versus 16) and more state government trifectas (15 versus 6) in Democratic hands more favorable to meeting the challenge of decarbonization.

In all these places we are sharing our work at no cost with partner newsrooms, doing our part to sustain and strengthen the national capacity to report environmental news. Given that the stakes are planetary, perhaps ours has become the least appreciated and most important kind of news there is. That’s why you’ll find no paywall here. No subscription fees. No ads. Monetary barriers to knowledge, the distractions of consumerism – neither will help us serve the urgent need.

But still, we need your help to sustain and grow a healthy ecosystem of environmental attention. The reliable, fair and accurate work of each of our reporters is more indispensable than ever. And we need to grow our ranks. We need your support to face the years ahead. We need you in our corner.

Thank you for being a reader.

David Sassoon is the Founder and Publisher of Inside Climate News.