Donald Trump's success in the American presidential election: the victory of climate skepticism

The 47th President of the United States says global warming is a “hoax”. During the Covid-19 health crisis, Donald Trump, while he was already in power at that time, questioned, on numerous occasions, the scientific word.

For years, the billionaire, back at the head of the world's leading power, has been calling into question well-established facts. In the spring of 2020, in the White House press room, in the midst of the Covid crisis, in front of the stunned eyes of his scientific advisors, Donald Trump suggested a method to eradicate the virus.“I see the disinfectant eliminates it in a minute. Is there a way to do something, by an injection inside the body? Almost a cleaning?”he said at that time. During this health crisis, Donald Trump constantly challenges the scientific word: on the seriousness of Covid, the usefulness of the mask, the “social distancing” or confinements. He even goes so far as to suspend funding to the World Health Organization (WHO), which he accuses of poorly managing the pandemic.

We also know his climate skepticism, again going against the scientific consensus. In September 2020, visiting California ravaged by fires, he denied global warming. “It’s going to start to cool down,” he said to an elected official who called on him to review forest management. Global warming is a “prank” for Donald Trump. At the head of the second most polluting country in the world, he intends to once again leave the Paris agreement to free himself from American commitments on the climate.

These “anti-science” positions have very concrete consequences for American research. During his first term, the billionaire attempted to cut the budgets of the “National Institutes of Health,” which deals with medical research, as well as that of the National Science Foundation. Without success, Congress had prevented it. It also temporarily tightened visas for student researchers.

Donald Trump, however, is not hostile to all areas of science. He is a defender of what is called “technosolutionism”, or how hypothetical discoveries and technological progress will make it possible to overcome, in particular, the climate crisis. He also campaigns for artificial intelligence and the conquest of space, dear to one of his most publicized and generous supporters, a certain Elon Musk.