Trump Pushes Deranged Idea That Climate Change Is Good for Real Estate
At a Tuesday night campaign rally in Michigan, Donald Trump briefly strayed from a point about international affairs to make an absurd remark about climate change. Claiming that nuclear proliferation is the true “global warming” (even as the former president has faced criticism for accelerating the nuclear arms race), Trump said, “When I hear these people talking about global warming, that’s the global warming you have to worry about, not that the ocean’s going to rise in 400 years an eighth of an inch.”Trump then went on to speak rosily about rising sea levels: “You’ll have more seafront property, right, if that happens. I said, is that good or bad? I said, isn’t that a good thing? If I have a little property on the ocean, I have a little bit more property—I have a little bit more ocean.”According to a CNN fact-check of similar claims Trump has made in the past, his estimate is a severe lowball: “Sea level rise is already more than an eighth of an inch annually—and it is accelerating.” But perhaps more baffling is the idea that climate change will create more opportunities for real estate.Shared on social media by the Kamala Harris campaign and other accounts, Trump’s comments immediately generated ridicule. Users on X, for example, have pointed out that the Michiganders Trump was addressing would probably not “have more seafront property,” barring an impossible catastrophe in which oceans rose hundreds of feet. (In reality, climate change reportedly threatens the region in other ways, including rising lake levels.)Reporter Tom McKay posted, “won’t there actually be less ‘seafront’ property because the land area necessarily contracts when sea levels rise.” Jim Swift of The Bulwark shared a meme noting that rising sea levels could threaten Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort. Others criticized Trump’s comments for trivializing the grave threat climate change poses to human life. The youth climate group Climate Defiance, for example, cited the World Economic Forum’s estimate that 410 million people “could be displaced or harmed by sea level rise this century.”
At a Tuesday night campaign rally in Michigan, Donald Trump briefly strayed from a point about international affairs to make an absurd remark about climate change.
Claiming that nuclear proliferation is the true “global warming” (even as the former president has faced criticism for accelerating the nuclear arms race), Trump said, “When I hear these people talking about global warming, that’s the global warming you have to worry about, not that the ocean’s going to rise in 400 years an eighth of an inch.”
Trump then went on to speak rosily about rising sea levels: “You’ll have more seafront property, right, if that happens. I said, is that good or bad? I said, isn’t that a good thing? If I have a little property on the ocean, I have a little bit more property—I have a little bit more ocean.”
According to a CNN fact-check of similar claims Trump has made in the past, his estimate is a severe lowball: “Sea level rise is already more than an eighth of an inch annually—and it is accelerating.” But perhaps more baffling is the idea that climate change will create more opportunities for real estate.
Shared on social media by the Kamala Harris campaign and other accounts, Trump’s comments immediately generated ridicule.
Users on X, for example, have pointed out that the Michiganders Trump was addressing would probably not “have more seafront property,” barring an impossible catastrophe in which oceans rose hundreds of feet. (In reality, climate change reportedly threatens the region in other ways, including rising lake levels.)
Reporter Tom McKay posted, “won’t there actually be less ‘seafront’ property because the land area necessarily contracts when sea levels rise.” Jim Swift of The Bulwark shared a meme noting that rising sea levels could threaten Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort.
Others criticized Trump’s comments for trivializing the grave threat climate change poses to human life. The youth climate group Climate Defiance, for example, cited the World Economic Forum’s estimate that 410 million people “could be displaced or harmed by sea level rise this century.”
