Exclusive– Rep. Byron Donalds: Radical European Climate Agenda ‘Ten Years Ahead of Where We Are Right Now’

Democrats are continuing to push their radical climate agenda despite 9.1 percent inflation and high food and gas prices — an effort Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL) contends signals last-minute desperation before a highly anticipated “red wave.”

Breitbart News spoke exclusively with the congressmen at Turning Point USA’s Student Action Summit in Tampa, Florida, about how Democrats are pursuing far-left climate policies contrary to the interests of the American public, as well as future ramifications for the United States. This reporter asked Florida’s 19th Congressional District representative why his Democrat colleagues continue to push their climate agenda ahead of elections when polls show Americans are most concerned about the economy.

“Listen — the one thing about the Democrats is, it doesn’t matter what’s going on in the world, they are looking to advance the agenda. The answer is always their agenda — it doesn’t matter. ‘Why is it raining so much?’ The answer is their agenda. ‘Why is the sun out too long?’ The answer is their agenda. That’s what they’re always going to default to,” Donalds replied.

“And now they’re in a place where they are about to lose their majorities, so they are trying to push everything to the table as quickly as they can because they know, once it hits January of 2023 and a new majority is sworn in, they won’t have the ability to do anything,” he continued.

Climate activists, and far-left Democrats especially, have been pushing for the Biden administration to declare a “climate emergency,” which would supposedly give President Joe Biden more authority to halt crude oil exports and restrict international trade in fossil fuels, among other measures. Biden has not yet done so, though Special Presidential Climate Envoy John Kerry has insinuated that declaring an emergency is not about if but when.

Additionally, since Breitbart News’s interview with Donalds, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) proposed a reconciliation package that would create $369 billion in climate change and energy security-related programs. However, the package, dubbed “The Inflation Reduction Act,” will add more fuel to the “inflation fire,” according to a study of the bill’s provisions by a top Republican lawmaker.

When asked what Democrats and elites stand to gain from their overarching climate agenda, Donalds suggested that the showy “go green” display could be the cover for a larger power grab.

“I honestly don’t even know — it perplexes me. I mean sometimes there are people who say that the people who are into the Green New Deal — like it’s really just the old red deal, but they just can’t be communists anymore or Marxists. Now they have to be environmentalists,” the lawmaker said.

“Honestly, they are so prescribed to these policies, that they don’t know how to get out of it. And so, sometimes when people are stuck, they just have to continue to go that entire way. But it’s been disastrous for the country,” he added. “I wish they would reverse course. I wish they would actually wake up and realize that reality is here, and now we have to make the appropriate decisions on behalf of the American people.”

This reporter brought up how climate change policies are effecting European countries, mentioning specifically how outdoor events were banned in parts of France due to a heat wave, as well as the Netherlands, where farmers are protesting the government’s controversial plan to reduce nitrogen emissions by 50 percent. The policy could cause upwards of 30 percent of the nation’s farmlands to shut down, threatening the livelihoods of thousands, many of whose families worked the land for generations.

When asked if those types of policies could ever be implemented in the United States, Donalds said, “100 percent.”

“The Europeans are ten years ahead of where we are right now. So can it be possible? One hundred percent. This is why it is important for the American people to understand that they cannot follow this insane Green New Deal policy,” he said. “Listen, I understand that people want to save the planet. I want to preserve the planet for my children and for their children. Everybody wants to preserve the planet, but you cannot do it with these radical environmental policies.”

He continued:

Especially when we know right now that, number one, when you get solar panels, most of that’s coming from China. So China is doing the dirtiest mining on the globe, they are using slave labor to mine for the minerals. So you can get your solar panel on your roof and act like you’re green? No. And then when the solar panels actually run out and you throw them away, all the metals are seeping into the groundwater. California is having to deal with this right now. And so you can still be green, but you can’t do this stuff.

We should be fully embracing nuclear in the United States, obviously continuing with natural gas, and yes, oil. You do those three things, you’ll actually have a much cleaner energy matrix that emits much less than even where we are right now and where we were ten years ago.

In the United States, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is currently trying to pass a rule which would require public companies to report their carbon emissions, as well as the emissions of any companies involved in the process of public company products. Donalds joined in a letter with his GOP colleagues to the SEC in late July in an effort to support small businesses “against the Biden administration’s all-our assault on their economic future…” House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) recently said the proposed rule could be “the biggest long-term damage there is” of any Biden policy.

“This is crazy stuff. The compliance is way too high, nobody is ever going to get it right — but this is the way the political left can get you under their thumb,” Donalds warned when asked about the proposed rule. “Gensler at the SEC, in my view, has been a maniac with some of the rules that he has wanted to put forward. This is not how you run an economy. And so we have to stop this stuff right here and right now.”

Donalds concluded by stating that “liberal fascism has no place in a free market economy.”

“And when you put these fascist markers, like energy scores, or social scores, or these governance scores, you’re putting non-financial, political measures ahead of actual financial data that matters far more when you’re making investments and when you’re growing a business,” he said.

Katherine Hamilton is a politics reporter for Breitbart News. You can follow her on Twitter here.