Radical climate change activist Greta Thunberg slammed President Joe Biden at a climate change protest in Berlin on September 24.
Thunberg scoffed at Biden’s “Build Back Better” agenda and suggested that the President’s rhetoric is only meant to pacify far-left activists who want to enact climate change.
“And now, as we move out of the pandemic, many are talking about using this as an opportunity for a green, sustainable recovery, whatever that means,” she said. “And world leaders are talking about ‘building back better,’ promising green investments, and setting vague and distant climate targets in order to say that they are taking climate action.”
Her comments come on the heels of President Biden’s address to the United Nations General Assembly in New York on September 21, in which Biden outlined his plan to achieve zero-net-energy emissions by 2050.
“In April, I announced the United States’ ambitious new goal under the Paris Agreement: to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from the United States by 50 to 52 percent, below 2005 levels by 2030, as we work toward achieving a clean energy economy with net-zero emissions by 2050,” Biden said. “And my administration is working closely with our Congress to make critical investments in green infrastructure and electric vehicles, that will help us lock in progress at home toward our climate goals.”
Though Biden explained his goals of an economic overhaul over the next three decades, his plan fails to satisfy Thunberg’s concerns. “The fact that we are in a crisis that we cannot build, buy, or invest our way out of seems to create some kind of collective mental short-circuit among the people in power,” Thunberg added. “And the longer that they pretend that we can solve the climate crisis within today’s system, the more invaluable time we will lose.”
“But even if we ignore that fact, when you look at what we are actually investing the money – the money that supposed to be building back better – it shows the hypocrisy of our leaders” she explained. “It turns out that the green recovery they are talking about isn’t so green after all.”
Thunberg went on to express that “no political party is doing close to enough, but it’s even worse than that. Not even their proposed commitments are close to being in line with what would be needed to fulfill the Paris Agreement.”
“If we want to ensure a safe presence and future on planet earth, we need to be active Democratic citizens and go out on the streets like we are doing today,” she said. “We must keep going into the streets and we must keep demanding our leaders to take real climate action.”