Our oceans are dying

By Finn Helgenberg
Reader Contributor

In North Idaho, we are feeling the ill effects of the cuts President Donald Trump is making. As Trump downsizes Forest Service personnel, he is also downsizing the protection we would normally have from disasters such as wildfires. Without the security from these people, we are more at risk than ever before. The president of the United States is killing our planet. 

Can we really blame him for this, though? As a country, reflection is necessary for finding the reason for placing such a heartless man in such a high place of power; he is most certainly to blame for the decline that our environment will soon be facing. President Trump is a longtime denier of global warming and, now that he is back in power, he is defunding the organizations that protect the forests and oceans. In doing this he is not just putting the United States at risk, but also the billions of others who live in our world.

Dead fish and discarded plastic from the ocean. Courtesy photo

Trump is looking to cut National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) funding by 20-50%. In doing this he is causing thousands of people to lose their jobs. Included within these thousands of people being “let go” are the scientists who protect the diverse ecosystems of Earth. Without these people, we lose our safeguards, which we greatly need. 

Trump claims the U.S. has entered an energy emergency. In the same statement, he said that the Endangered Species Act (ESA) cannot become an obstacle for energy development. This puts thousands of land and marine animals in danger. This also puts the jobs for those studying those animals at risk. If we proceed with drilling at the expense of ESA protections, the planet will continue on an anthropogenically fueled downward spiral. Animals will die, the oceans will heat up and become toxic, and the rate of climate change will quicken.

Trump knows little concerning Earth’s climate. At one point, the president went as far as claiming that climate change was a “scam.” He even pulled the country away from the Paris Agreement (PA), which was put in place to combat climate change and the negative reactions occurring because of it. President Trump made this decision because he said that the agreement did not reflect U.S. values and would “unfairly burden the United States.” To call any burden imposed by the PA “unfair” is a stretch, as the U.S. is the second-largest contributor emitter of greenhouse gasses. 

The president’s simple homogenization of the diverse values of the nation’s people is also unfair. The Paris Agreement recognized, “… the need for an effective and progressive response to the urgent threat of climate change on the basis of the best available scientific knowledge … .” 

The PA was ratified by every nation on Earth, apart from a few countries that were ravaged by civil war or did not think that the document went far enough to combat global warming. Without it, Earth’s temperature will rise, storms will become harsher and poverty will become more rampant.

Beyond blaming just one person for the devastating ways the planet is being affected by climate change, individual responsibility must also be taken for the way the climate is changing. According to the European Union’s database of global emissions, the U.S. contributed around 5,960 metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalents in 2023 alone — more than 11% of the global total. Each person within the United States is to blame for the worldwide emissions that are produced. Americans overconsume everything from food to clothes, which heightens the rate that these products are produced. Overall, nothing will be accomplished by blaming anyone but ourselves. The only thing we can do to stop the climate change crisis is to change our individual ways. 

Though some might be fooled by his flashy speeches and grand promises, it is evident that Earth is suffering under the supervision of President Trump. One must remember that Trump is not just a man, but the president of the United States. In being the president, he has failed us by showing such an indifference to the environment. 

Ideally, as a leader, he would be able to find a balance between what is best for the survival of species and what is best for the U.S.; in his lack of doing so, it is evident that he is at fault. 

If we want any hope for our oceans and lands, we must revolt against this apathy that threatens to consume us. Trump is killing us. 

Finn Helgenberg is a ninth-grade student in the Lake Pend Oreille School District.