By Maxine Joselow, The New York Times
Yesterday I found myself in a strange setting: the ballroom in the basement of a hotel in downtown Washington. I was there to cover a conference hosted by groups that reject the overwhelming scientific consensus on climate change.
It might have seemed like a fringe event, except for the high-profile opening speaker: Lee Zeldin, the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency and one of President Trump’s possible choices for the next attorney general.
The mood in the room was celebratory. The roughly 220 attendees at the gathering at the Hotel Washington, which is a short walk from the White House, treated Zeldin like a rock star, giving him a standing ovation before he had even spoken.
“We aren’t just following blind obedience to whatever the dire, doom-and-gloom prediction of the day is,” Zeldin said, drawing more applause.
In some ways, Zeldin was echoing his boss: Trump has called climate change a “hoax” and “the greatest con job ever perpetrated on the world.” And his administration has systematically sought to slash federal funding for climate research while dismantling dozens of climate and environmental regulations.
‘A moment of triumph’
As I reported in an article published today, the event made clear that climate change deniers are seeing a new level of prominence in Trump’s Washington after years of feeling sidelined by the political and scientific establishments.
It was organized by the Heartland Institute, a research organization that has fought mainstream climate science for decades. James M. Taylor, the president of the institute, told me that the Trump administration had done more for his group than any other administration in history.
“This is absolutely a moment of triumph,” he said, adding, “It’s nice to be winning.”
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