Lastly: this thread is on Bluesky. Reluctantly cross-posting thanks to my much larger follower count here. Come see me over there tho. (16/16)

I don’t ever want to hear people like John Kerry tell me again that “no government has the money to fix the climate crisis.” Absolutely just fuck the hell off with that, it was bullshit then and it’s even more transparently bullshit now. (15/16).

If we chose to make solving the debt, development, global health, and climate crises our priorities, instead of trying to make white nationalism official government policy, imagine the resources we could find and the solutions we could fund. (14/16).

Obviously Rs are trying to pay for this by doing abhorrent things like slashing Medicaid & other essential social services, so it’s not as if money is coming from nowhere. But the point remains: if people in power decide something is important, they find the resources. (13/16).

The $200 billion Congress wants to spend on detaining and deporting immigrants is 11,428 times more than the $17.5 million contribution the U.S. has made to the @FRLossandDamage. (12/16).

The $200 billion Congress wants to spend on detaining and deporting immigrants is 1,000 times more than the annualized contribution the U.S. has made to @theGCF - $2 billion over the past 10 years. (11/16).

The $200 billion Congress wants to spend on detaining and deporting immigrants is almost 10x more than ACTUAL climate finance flows from ALL developed countries, according to Oxfam’s Climate Finance Shadow Report analysis which puts those flows at $21-24 billion per year. (10/16).

The $200 billion Congress wants to spend on detaining and deporting immigrants is 2x the annual climate finance target from 2020-2035, and two-thirds of the revised target in the NCQG agreed last year. Those are targets for ALL developed countries, not just the US. (9/16).

The $200 billion Congress wants to spend on detaining and deporting immigrants is 625x more than the annualized amount that the U.S. has contributed to the Gavi vaccine alliance over 25 years ($8 billion total, or $320 million per year). (8/16).

The $200 billion Congress wants to spend on detaining and deporting immigrants is 2.5x more than food assistance from ALL donor countries, which FAO estimates to be about $76 billion per year from 2017-2021. (7/16).

The $200 billion Congress wants to spend on detaining and deporting immigrants is 4x all U.S. foreign aid in 2023 (not including aid to Israel and Ukraine). 2023 US foreign totaled $71 billion; $20 billion of that was to Ukraine and Israel alone. (6/16).

OK now for the “fun” part. The $200 billion Congress wants to spend on detaining and deporting immigrants is more than the widely recognized UN ODA target of 0.7% of GNI. In 2023, US GNI was about $27.5 trillion; 0.7% of that is $193 billion. (5/16).

What if we compare to other law enforcement spending? This graphic from the Cato Institute of all places tells the story. (4/16)

Second, CBP and ICE funding peaked last year at nearly $30 billion. That was a record high, and now suddenly we’re talking about essentially increasing it BY AN ORDER OF MAGNITUDE. (3/16).

First of all, let’s be clear that ICE is basically acting as Trump’s unaccountable secret police force. They wear masks, they don’t identify themselves, they literally kidnap people off the street, they arrest and detain U.S. citizens and elected officials. (2/16).

The budget reconciliation bill Congress is considering would bring funding for immigration enforcement to $200 billion for FY2025 alone. It’s hard to explain how utterly insane this is, but here’s an attempt – with comparisons to #FFD4, foreign aid, climate finance etc. (1/16).

The climate nerd community is still very strong here, but I hope many of my nearly 5K+ followers will come over to Bluesky. Just so much less toxicity. Hoping that #COP29 was my last round of intensive activity in this cesspool.

Good summary. The $1.3tn feels like it will most likely become a meaningless accounting exercise, counting the sum of climate investments happening globally rather than actually incentivizing more.

The road from Paris to Baku #COP29 is the story of the US trying to kill the very idea that the Global North owes anything to the Global South. Regardless of what the US says, the obligations exist. And we'll keep fighting. My comments on @democracynow

Entire op-ed is in the The Guardian: