Trump: Climate Will 'Change Back Again'

'I don't think it's a hoax,' he tells 60 Minutes
By Rob Quinn,  Newser Staff
Posted Oct 15, 2018 5:32 AM CDT
Trump: Climate Change 'Not a Hoax,' But It'll 'Change Back'
President Trump waves to members of the media as he arrives at Andrews Air Force Base, Md., Saturday, Oct. 13, 2018.   (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)

President Trump apparently no longer believes that climate change is a "hoax"—but he does believe it will somehow change back, and he doesn't want to spend too much money dealing with it, despite dire warnings from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. "I think something's happening. Something's changing and it'll change back again," Trump said in a 60 Minutes interview that was broadcast Sunday night. "I don't think it's a hoax. I think there's probably a difference. But I don't know that it's manmade. I will say this: I don't want to give trillions and trillions of dollars. I don't want to lose millions and millions of jobs." He added that he's not "denying climate change," but it "could very well go back ... millions of years," the AP reports.

When interviewer Leslie Stahl asked Trump about climate change creating more powerful hurricanes, the president, who will visit hurricane-hit parts of Florida and Georgia on Monday, seemed doubtful. "You'd have to show me the scientists because they have a very big political agenda," he said when Stahl told him scientists had determined that hurricanes were worse than ever. More from the interview:

  • Putin "probably" behind assassinations. Trump said Russian leader Vladimir Putin was "probably" behind the assassination of diplomats, but it didn't seem like he was losing sleep over it, the Washington Post reports. "It's not in our country," he said. Trump also told Stahl that Russia meddled in the 2016 election, but said China had done the same. "I think, frankly, China is a bigger problem," he said.
  • "We won" on Christine Blasey Ford. Trump said the speech in which he mocked Ford help secure Brett Kavanaugh's confirmation to the Supreme Court, MarketWatch reports. Asked whether he believed Ford's accusations, Trump said: "I'm not going to get into it because we won. It doesn't matter. We won."
  • Kim Jong Un is what he is. Asked about his professed "love" of North Korean dictator Kim despite human rights abuses including the use of gulags and slave labor, Trump said: "I get along with him, OK?" He added: "Let it be whatever it is. I get along with him really well. I have a good energy with him."
  • "Nobody treats us worse." Trump was harder on the European Union, saying nobody treats the US worse than the trading bloc. "The European Union was formed in order to take advantage of us on trade, and that’s what they’ve done," he said.
  • No chaos here. Trump rejected suggestions that there was chaos inside his administration, but admitted that figures including Defense Secretary Jim Mattis could soon be leaving, the Post reports. "I think he’s sort of a Democrat, if you want to know the truth," Trump said. "But General Mattis is a good guy. We get along very well. He may leave. I mean, at some point, everybody leaves. Everybody."
(More climate change stories.)

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