OPINION | Corey Lewandowski: Obama’s Paris climate deal was bad for US workers and American jobs

When President Donald Trump was on the campaign trail, he promised to reduce government interference in energy exploration, reduce our dependence on foreign oil, and cancel the Paris climate accord. Candidate Trump was quoted by NBC News on May 26, 2016, explaining that “my agenda is job creation,” while he ripped Hillary Clinton for supporting anti-energy policies that destroy jobs. President Obama’s agreement in Paris in 2015 was a bad idea then, and President Trump is certainly justified in following through by pulling out of this one-sided deal.

The Paris climate agreement violates President Trump’s campaign promise to the American people that he would create, not destroy, jobs for U.S. workers. An “America First” energy policy does not allow European bureaucrats to determine how much energy Americans can use. The Paris agreement was joined in haste by President Obama in a way that imposed hefty costs on Americans for the benefit of other countries. I remember Mr. Trump saying on the campaign trail that the United States pays billions of dollars while China, Russia and India will contribute nothing. 

Not anymore.

Even though the mainstream media would like you to believe that President Trump’s first four months were not a success, they ignore the many promises kept by the president using executive action. Candidate Trump promised to withdraw from the Paris agreement, and he kept that promise. The fake news media fails to give the president his due credit when he takes actions to protect the American economy from things like flawed deals that destroy American jobs and regulate the American economy to the point of stagnation in European-like fashion.

{mosads}Critics of President Trump falsely complain that his administration plays fast and loose with the facts. Here are the facts.

According to a study by The Heritage Foundation released in 2016, if the Obama Paris agreement were to be followed, “there would be 206,104 fewer manufacturing jobs between 2016 and 2040.” Heritage projects a loss of over $2.5 trillion in aggregate loss of gross domestic product by 2035.

The Competitive Enterprise Institute put out a similar report in May of 2017, which found that “the United States cannot comply with the Paris Agreement and pursue a pro-growth energy agenda.” The group concluded that the agreement’s “central goal is to make fossil fuels, America’s most plentiful and affordable energy source, more expensive across the board” and “would destroy U.S. manufacturing’s energy price edge.” 

These numbers are hard to dispute, even for the most committed global warming alarmist.

If Trump pulls the US out of the #ParisAgreement he will be committing a traitorous act of war against the American people. My statement: pic.twitter.com/Qjgxm4fELp

— Tom Steyer (@TomSteyer) May 29, 2017

If Hillary Clinton had won the election, her administration would have continued the war on coal that would have successfully resulted in her campaign promise to “put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business.” The left is beside itself making the case that pulling out of this anti-American deal is “a traitorous act of war against the American people,” because liberals don’t care about American jobs, and they don’t care that this agreement would destroy the domestic economy. 

If these Democrats had their way, some 40,000 factories would close and more Americans would be on public assistance; yet they would feel better that they tried to use government power to stop the use of fossil fuels that heat our homes and fuel our cars, and put Americans in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Ohio out on the streets.

This agreement was a scam that ultimately hurt U.S. economy and worker productivity. Thankfully, President Trump saw through the rhetoric of the climate change alarmists and withdrew America from the Paris agreement, just as he said he would. Keeping his campaign promises will Make America Great Again!

Corey R. Lewandowski served as campaign manager for President Donald J. Trump.

The views expressed by contributors are their own and are not the views of The Hill.