From Watts Up With That?

Essay by Eric Worrall

“… climate deniers have been privately celebrating what they claim is the “silent” acquiescence of billionaires, Democrats, climate activists and even reporters …”

Trump has launched an unprecedented assault on the environment. Where’s the pushback?

Rei Takver
Thu 5 Mar 2026 03.56 AEDTLast modified on Thu 5 Mar 2026 13.35 AEDT

Climate deniers expected more resistance to the fossil fuel blitz. But Democrats, billionaires and activists have gone silent

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As Donald Trump assaults the legal foundation of America’s ability to regulate global warming emissions, climate deniers have been privately celebrating what they claim is the “silent” acquiescence of billionaires, Democrats, climate activists and even reporters to the president’s aggressive pro-fossil-fuel agenda.

“In my 26 years of being focused on climate, I’ve never seen anything like this. Trump is gutting everything they ever stood for,” Marc Morano, a longtime climate denier, said in January at the World Prosperity Forum, a five-day event in Zurich, Switzerland, billed as a rightwing alternative to the World Economic Forum in Davos.

“Billionaires are silent. Democrats in Congress have been silent. Climate activists. There has been no pushback on this,” Morano said – and he may have a point, according to some experts who research the climate denial movement.

“The Trump administration just marched in and destroyed the crown jewel of climate science in the United States,” Robert Brulle, a professor of environment and society at Brown University, told me, referring to the Trump administration’s dismantling of the country’s premier climate research center, the National Center for Atmospheric Research, in December.

“And nothing happened. There wasn’t even a whimper. I never thought I’d ever say this: Marc Morano is correct.”

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Microsoft and Amazon, which had donated large sums to Trump’s inauguration fund, have both recently embraced fossil-fuel powered AI data centers alongside Trump energy officials and fossil fuel industry players.

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Why? “In today’s deeply polarizing US political stance, climate discussion has come to feel so radioactive that many leaders would rather avoid it,” Anjali Chaudhry, a business sustainability researcher at Dominican University, wrote in Forbes.

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For Brulle, the environmental sociologist, addressing the growing hush around climate must go beyond talking.

“I think the climate movement in the United States has failed. It has flat failed, and that means we need to rebuild this movement in a completely different manner,” he said.

…Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/mar/04/trump-climate-change-democrats

The reason is obvious. The climate crisis was never real, it was just a means to an end. Climate activists have long accused skeptics of being payed shills of the fossil fuel industry, but the reality is it was always the climate activists who were the useful idiots.

The climate crisis was only supported by politicians so long as it could frighten moderate conservatives into supporting liberals. Now that only the most committed leftists still take climate warnings seriously, the fake climate crisis has outlived its political usefulness.

The AI revolution delivered the finishing blow to a narrative which was already on the way out. But it also offered a new opportunity to those whose campaign style exploits fear of the unknown.

Not only did the AI revolution force big tech to reverse course and support President Trump’s “Drill baby drill” energy abundance agenda, it also created a new fake crisis with greater bipartisan appeal than the failed climate crisis narrative.

The smarter Democrats are already seizing the opportunity. Bernie Sanders has jumped ship onto the new fake AI crisis.

‘Slow this thing down’: Sanders warns US has no clue about speed and scale of coming AI revolution

After meeting with unspecified tech leaders, senator calls for urgent policy action as companies race to build ever more powerful systems

…Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/feb/21/ai-revolution-bernie-sanders-warning

Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer is also jumping on the anti-AI bandwagon.

Americans Hate AI. Which Party Will Benefit?

Party insiders are divided on how to channel Americans’ growing fear of AI.

It’s become a common occurrence: Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer posts a light-hearted video on social media. She’s Christmas shopping, or she’s talking about her Michigan accent or she’s touting her administration’s accomplishments. And immediately, the comments start rolling in, all demanding the same thing: Say no to data centers in the state. Stop construction. “All I want for Christmas is legislation banning data centers in Michigan.”

National figures in the party are beginning to notice the anger. What began on the ground with widespread protests against the facilities that provide infrastructure for the growth of artificial intelligence is finding its way into new plans, memos and rhetoric as the Democratic Party thinks about how to win in 2026 and 2028.

…Read more: https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2025/12/28/ai-job-losses-populism-democrats-bernie-sanders-00706680

My prediction – if Governor Whitmer gathers enough momentum for her anti-data center crusade, she will be the surprise 2028 Democratic Presidential nominee.

Expect to see a lot more AI scare tactics in coming months and years, as Democrat politicians and former climate activists reposition themselves to align with bipartisan concerns about AI, and try to convince voters they are the defenders of the people against the rising AI menace.