On an August afternoon in Maricopa County last year, the temperature climbed past 110 degrees almost every day, turning sidewalks into scorching plates of metal and making even brief outdoor walks unbearable. Maricopa County, home to Phoenix and the surrounding neighborhoods, is very familiar with heat. But the sheer intensity of recent summers has been staggering. In 2024, Phoenix endured a record 113 consecutive days above 100°F, with 70 days at or above 110°F, the highest number on record. Local officials counted hundreds of heat-related deaths in Maricopa County alone, a sobering reminder that extreme heat is now one of the deadliest weather threats Americans face [1].

Climate change denial is no longer an option. Across the county, hospitals reported thousands of emergency room visits for heat-related illnesses, while public health officials rushed to expand cooling centers and outreach to vulnerable residents. Climate change is no longer a distant future but a present-day crisis felt most by the elderly, the unhoused, and working families who cannot escape the brutal heat. Extreme heat does not simply make summers uncomfortable; It strains power grids, overwhelms emergency rooms, and takes lives. In California, rising temperatures have similarly driven thousands of heat-related hospitalizations in recent years, disproportionately affecting low-income and marginalized communities [2].

Yet at the federal level, the United States has chosen to ignore these threats, instead choosing “America First.” Under the current Trump administration, the federal government has reversed major climate policies and withdrawn from the Paris Agreement, signaling that emissions reduction is no longer a priority of American diplomacy [3]. Environmental regulations have been rolled back, and incentives for clean energy have been scaled back in favor of expanded fossil fuel development. These choices shape where capital flows, which industries grow, and whether communities are prepared for a hotter and more volatile future.

This reversal also reveals a deeper structural weakness in American climate policy: the four-year presidential cycle. Many of the Biden administration’s climate initiatives, from international commitments to domestic policies, were undone almost immediately following the change in leadership. Climate change, however, does not operate on election calendars. Effective mitigation and adaptation require consistency across administrations, not policy whiplash every four years.

Supporters of the Trump administration’s withdrawal argue that deregulation protects American jobs or energy independence. But climate change does not respect borders—recent scientific assessments suggest that human-driven global warming made 2025 heatwaves up to ten times more likely than they otherwise would have been [4]. The lived reality for Americans today is already one of hotter summers, longer fire seasons, and more destructive storms, trends that strain infrastructure, threaten public health, and widen existing inequalities.

While the United States is taking a step back, other global leaders are stepping forward in climate action. In 2025, China announced a new climate target to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 7 to 10 percent from peak levels by 2035 while significantly expanding renewable energy capacity [5]. While many analysts argue this pledge still falls short of what science demands, it nonetheless reflects a forward-looking commitment to a long-term emissions trajectory [6]. China’s announcement was framed as part of a broader global transition toward cleaner energy systems. 

Climate policy today is about more than environmental science. It is about economic strategy, policy, and global influence. For decades, the United States helped shape the international climate framework through scientific leadership and technological innovation. But leadership also requires persistence. When American climate policy resets every four years, it undermines trust abroad and leaves communities at home exposed.

The heat waves of recent years have already led us to reconsider what was once perceived as a distant future. The choice before the United States is no longer whether climate change is real or urgent. It is whether America is willing to commit to sustained action beyond a single presidency, or whether it will continue its destructive approach, leaving other countries to bear the burden on their own.