Many protestors concerned about climate change stormed the stage where U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg was being interviewed Thursday in Baltimore.
Buttigieg was in town at a daylong conference to discuss new transportation updates for the state. The conference, iMPACT MARYLAND, was hosted by The Baltimore Banner and intended to focus on the future of the state.
In a series of posts on X, formerly known as Twitter, Buttigieg said the updates include an expansion of the Baltimore airport, converting the University of Maryland’s bus fleet to electric vehicles, replacing diesel trains with battery-powered ones, and updating a transportation station to be accessible for wheelchair users and pedestrians.
Members of the Climate Defiance group came on stage, carrying signs and shouting in opposition to a Texas petrochemical project.
“Stop Petro Pete,” they said, among other chants.
“Your [Department of Transportation] just approved the Seaport Oil Terminal, a project that will have 80 coal plants worth of greenhouse gas emissions and will worsen air qualities in areas that already live in a cancer cluster,” one protestor said to Buttigieg on stage.
The Seaport Oil Terminal project was approved by the Biden administration last year and would be located off the shore of Freeport, Texas. Environmental activism groups have opposed the decision.
“This is about environmental racism and it’s about the climate this project will have,” he said in the video posted to the Climate Defiance group’s page on X. “Will you commit to stopping these projects?”
“So I don’t want to say anything off the cuff but I respect where you’re coming from,” Buttigieg said in response, before getting cut off by the protestors.
The video then shows Buttigieg and his security leaving the stage, with some protestors attempting to follow him. Security forcefully blocked the path off-stage and tried to remove protestors from the theater.