In remarks about Maui and Idalia, Biden blames climate change

Speaking at the White House on Wednesday, President Biden spoke about the federal government’s response to the wildfires in Hawaii earlier this month and to those affected by Hurricane Idalia in the Southeast U.S. Biden blamed climate change for the many recent extreme weather events, saying, “I don’t think anybody can deny the impact of the climate crisis anymore.”

Video Transcript

JOE BIDEN: Federal teams on the ground are going to continue to work with the first responders in Florida, Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina to get people to safety. You've all been reporting this. You've seen it on television, there are a number of rescues already taking place as I walked out of my office a moment ago to begin to recover from the impacts of this storm. I let each governor I spoke with know if there's anything that states need right now, I'm ready to mobilize that support of what they need.

I don't think anybody can deny the impact of the climate crisis anymore. Just look around. Historic floods-- I mean, historic floods. More intense droughts, extreme heat, significant wildfires have caused significant damage like we've never seen before, not only throughout the Hawaiian islands in the United States, but in Canada and other parts of the world. We've never seen this much fire. And while we're dealing with this latest extreme weather event, I remain laser-focused on recovering and rebuilding efforts in Maui.

We were out there, and many of you were there as well. It's devastating what happened there. When I took office, I directed my team to raise our game in how we lead and coordinate our responses to natural disasters. And because I've been around a while, and I've known how these functioned to ensure we met people where they are when they need our help the most. Because of the devastation of wildfires from California, New Mexico, Oregon, Washington State, Idaho, and Louisiana, we've learned a heck a lot of damage in the meantime, but we've learned a heck of a lot, and we're putting the lessons we learned to work.