Mr Gore was moved to the point of tears recalling the sight of people in Minneapolis placing ‘I voted’ stickers at the places where Alex Pretti and Renee Good were gunned down by ICE agents earlier this year
For the second year running under Donald Trump’s presidency, there is no official presence from the US at the annual COP climate summit(Image: EMILY CURIEL/EPA/Shutterstock)
Former Vice President Al Gore spoke emotionally about seeing Americans vote in defiance of Donald Trump’s ‘broligarchy’.
A rogue “punk rock” delegation of American politicians defied Trump’s administration to take part in this week’s COP31 climate summit in Turkey.
For the second year running under Trump’s presidency, there is no official presence from the US at the annual summit, where 100,000 people from 193 countries have gathered to discuss the transition away from fossil fuels.
Trump pulled out of the Paris Climate Agreement – upon which much of the negotiations that take place at COP are based – as one of the first acts of his presidency.
But a group of 20 US State Governors, representatives and members of Congress have come in an unofficial capacity.
Speaking on the fringes of the conference in Antalya, Turkey, Mr Gore was moved to the point of tears recalling the sight of people in Minneapolis placing ‘I voted’ stickers at the places where Alex Pretti and Renee Good were gunned down by ICE agents earlier this year.
“Both of them were killed in sites very close together,” he told a small audience. “And I get emotional even thinking about it now, because on election day, there were thousands of people who came to the sites where they were murdered, with their ‘I voted’ stickers, and sticking them anywhere they could near the sites where those guests took place, as if to say these deaths were not in vain.”
He added: “I think the moral outrage was translated into a determination to say, No, this is unacceptable. I’m going to take action.”
Mr Gore added: “One of the other things that’s so heartening to me about this election is that even though Elon Musk been something like 600 million dollars, it had very little effect.”
John Kerry, former US Secretary of State during the Obama administration also spoke on the sidelines of the conference with a message of defiance against Trump’s apathy on climate change. “Donald Trump may have pulled out of the Paris Climate Agreement,” Mr Kerry said. “But the American people never pulled out of the Paris climate Agreement.”
He said the pounding suffered by Trump’s Republicans in the midterms was “powerful proof that given the choice between denial and delay on one side and common sense on the other, the American people are committed to fighting for their future.” He added: “Anyone who says this is a hoax and mot merited should not be serving in public life”
Linda Hopkins, chair of the Bay Area Air District and an elected county supervisor from Sonoma county California, is among the guerrilla delegation of defiant US politicians attending this week’s event in Turkey. She told the Mirror: “It feels like we’re sort of the underground, the punk rock band in defiance of authority. I love that energy.”
She added: “I feel the need to apologise as an American. It’s a loss to our country and to the world that the United States is not fully participating in these proceedings… I’m here to show up for the United States, who are not formally here, and also to exchange best practices and ideas and policies with colleagues from around the world.”
Toby Perkins, chair of the Commons Climate Audit Committee, also attending the conference, told the Mirror: “It certainly is disappointing [that the US is not here] because they have played a very important part and hope they will do again.
“I think the midterms open up interesting opportunities and there’s a number of governors and state senators here who we hope will try and keep that climate leadership going. But we’re hopefully into the final two years of the Trump administration and so there will be a day that’s the other side of this.”
Mr Gore was speaking at an event hosted by the TED organisation in Anadolu Park, in the picturesque foothills of the Taurus mountains. He noted there was just two years of the Trump administration to go: “If he makes it… I don’t mean that as a comment about his health, but he seems to be not doing well.”
He added: “I speak as an American, we’re just ready to get rid of this broligarchy that’s been making such terrible decisions and get back to democracy.”
