Tom Lantos: “climate diplomacy has been sidelined under this administration to such an extent that expertise and diplomatic stability…”

“climate diplomacy has been sidelined under this administration to such an extent that expertise and diplomatic stability in climate negotiations is now almost absent in the Department of State. It is long, long overdue that we reinvigorate the capability of the Department of State on the issue of global climate change and our legislation does that. We are also creating a foundation not as a bureaucracy but as an institution to act as a clearinghouse of ideas and the matchmaker amongst foreign public and private actors working on global clean energy technologies. Probably no single item has contributed as much to the decline of the United States' prestige internationally than our cavalier attitude towards global climate change. With a new administration coming in less than 1 rac{1}{2} ext{ years}, we preparing the ground that our global partners will again respect us and look to us for international leadership on this all-important issue.”