Kopp, Robert
cwg report w dessler
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MMA
January 25, 2026, episode of CNN This Morning Weekend
VICTOR BLACKWELL (ANCHOR): We're seeing the impacts of that winter storm across multiple states. This is Kansas City from our affiliate KMBC. You can see the roads covered in snow there. We'll keep you updated on the storm and where it's headed throughout the day here on CNN. Now, President Trump says that he's pulling the U.S. out of the global U.N. Climate treaty. The move would leave the U.S. out of international climate change talks and is likely to raise tensions even more with allies. The timing of the announcement is notable, as tens of millions of Americans are facing an enormous and potentially catastrophic winter storm. Let me bring in Robert Kopp. He's a climate scientist at Rutgers University and is lead author on U.N. climate assessments. Mr. Kopp, thank you for being with me. Let me first talk about the overlap between the big story of the day, the storm that's hitting so many Americans, and climate change.
The president posted on Truth Social. We can put it up on the screen, "Record cold wave expected to hit 40 states. Rarely seen anything like it before. Could the environmental insurrectionist please explain – Whatever happened to global warming?" Suggesting that the two were divorced from one another. What does he need to know?
ROBERT KOPP (CLIMATE SCIENTIST, RUTGERS UNIVERSITY): Well, he needs to know that the United States is not, in fact, the world, and global warming is a global phenomenon. Just because it's cold where I am, you know, it’s about 15 degrees outside here in New Jersey, doesn't mean it's cold everywhere. In Greenland, in fact, its highs today are above freezing. They're about 25 degrees above average. And in parts of south Australia there are 120 degrees. We also know that it's cold in winter, and it will continue to get cold, even as the average temperature of the planet increases.
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...grnwire
Scientists say the DOE Climate Working Group’s findings sound a lot like the misleading climate claims Wright has made over the years and the fringe views he has elevated. Much of the report is based on the authors’ own disputed claims, research funded by the fossil fuel industry or assertions made by groups opposed to climate regulation. Some of its primary assertions were debunked years ago.
And while the report frequently draws on mainstream climate research as well, multiple scientists said their work was misrepresented.
That includes Robert Kopp, a climate scientist at Rutgers University, who said the report’s reliance on his sea-level rise research was misrepresented by “cherry-picking” a single tide gauge. It’s a common technique used by the report’s authors, he said.
Kopp emphasized that few scientists in the field agree with the authors’ sweeping assertions even after years of claims.
“They found like five people who’ve made their careers over multiple decades in climate skepticism,” he said of the DOE author selection. “They haven’t managed to bring anybody else along to think of, there’s still the same set of five people, most of whom are rather late in their careers at this point.”
The DOE report comes as the Trump administration seeks to eliminate federal climate jobs en masse through the deletion of billions of dollars of climate research, entire science divisions at multiple agencies, government climate information and climate data-gathering instruments, including satellites now in orbit.
The Trump administration has also ended work on the National Climate Assessment, a congressionally mandated, yearslong report produced by hundreds of scientists, and removed earlier versions of the report from government websites....