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President Donald Trump once again questioned the scientific consensus behind climate change on Wednesday night because forecasters said it could be cold in parts of America this week.
"Brutal and Extended Cold Blast could break ALL RECORDS," said Trump, who is on a 80-degree vacation at his Mar-L-Lago club in Florida for Thanksgiving on Monday night. "What happened to global warming?"
The comments seem to refer to forecasts that some areas of the north-east could experience the coldest temperatures recorded at the end of November. AccuWeather said that the Thanksgiving weekend would be under freezing point from New York to Maine, and meteorologists told millions of Americans who could attend the coldest holiday weekend for more than a year. A century.
However, Trump's suggestion that cold weather means the climate does not change is wrong. NASA notes that the weather is a short-term event (precipitation, clouds, humidity, etc.), while the climate is a measure of the weather over a period of time.
"In most places, the weather can vary from minute to minute, hour to hour, day to day and season to season. The climate, however, is the average temperature in time and space, "says the agency on a government website. "An easy way to remember the difference is that the climate is what you expect, such as a very hot summer, and the weather that it does, like a hot day with instant storms."
Scientists around the world agree that the climate is changing rapidly and that the planet has already warmed up considerably since the pre – industrial era because of human activity. A historical scientific report published by 13 federal agencies last year reached the same conclusion.
Trump, however, has regularly expressed doubts about climate science and has appointed many like-minded officials, including leaders of the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of the Interior.
Climate scientists on Wednesday criticized the president 's message, saying there was "nothing unusual" to make it cold in November.
"This once again demonstrates that Donald Trump is not an individual to take seriously on a subject, let alone a problem as serious as climate change," said in an email to HuffPost Michael Mann, scientist in climatology at Pennsylvania State University. "He's a clown – a dangerous clown."
The president's comments come as California tackles the effects of several large-scale fires, including the devastating camp fire that killed at least 81 people. It is difficult to link a given natural disaster to climate change, but scientists have noted that California's climate has changed in recent decades, which could contribute to more frequent fires 'enlarge considerably.
"The fact is, if you look at the state of California, the climate is facing a climate challenge," said Los Angeles Fire Chief Daryl Osby earlier this month, while the region was facing another devastating fire. "He's going to be here for the foreseeable future."
Trump visited the ruins of Paradise, a city in northern California that was most affected by the camp's fire. When asked if he believed that climate change had contributed to the fire, the president objected, saying that "a lot of factors" were to blame.
"I have a strong opinion," he said. "I want a good climate."
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