WH’s laughable new excuse for ditching Paris accord: It "was not good for the environment"

And Trump’s head of the Environmental Protection Agency, Scott Pruitt, could not even give reporters a straight answer about the reasons for the decision.

At the time, Trump had promised that he would work to renegotiate a better deal, the absurdity of which former Secretary of State John Kerry likened to O.J. Simpson saying he’s going to “find the real killer.”

But apparently, that renegotiating talking point is still in play for the Trump administration, as National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster made clear Sunday morning in an interview with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos.

Following conflicting reports about the status of the United States’ involvement in the Paris agreement — where the Wall Street Journal reported that Trump would not be pulling out of the accord, which led to an immediate denial by the White House that such reporting was accurate — McMaster appeared on “This Week” to push the latter.

McMaster insisted that Trump is “not … against the environment or the climate,” and that the administration “had left the door open to re-entering it at some later time.”

He declared that Trump was “renewing our commitment” to clean air and water.

And amazingly, he claimed that the Paris agreement “was not good for the environment.” And he touted something odd about “clean fossil fuels.”

McMaster insisted that Trump was “open to any discussions that will help us improve the environment” and to possible remaining in the agreement if it can be renegotiated before the 2020 deadline.

McMaster: Trump’s objection on Paris deal “not that he’s against the environment or the climate,” but it “was not good for the environment.” pic.twitter.com/ca21Gpmu5r

— This Week (@ThisWeekABC) September 17, 2017

The fact is, if Trump truly cares so much about the environment, pulling away from the Paris accord with laughable claims of being able to score a “better” deal makes exactly zero sense.

If there were any legitimacy to such claims, Democrats would not have felt the need to push back so vehemently against the move. Even some Republicans recognize Trump’s decision as chaotic for the climate.

McMaster was clearly trying to hold onto the White House’s preferred spin on the subject. But this administration’s consistent science denialism will do nothing more than add to the “human tragedy” such thinking from the GOP has been wreaking for decades.

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