NOAA hires climate change denialist for top role

Please join the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in welcoming David Legates as its new as deputy assistant secretary of Commerce for observation and prediction. According to Science, Legates is a geography professor at the University of Delaware, with "a long history of questioning fundamental climate science and has suggested that an outcome of burning fossil fuels would be a more habitable planet for humans."

Legates has spent his career denying consensus climate science while elevating the work of fringe researchers and industry-funded scientists. He has claimed that addressing climate change would do more harm than good, and he has said pumping more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere would benefit humanity.

When testifying before the House of Representatives Natural Resources Committee last year, Legates blamed natural variations for the unprecedented level of warming that scientists say is caused by the release of carbon dioxide from human activity.

"Climate has always changed, and weather is always variable, due to complex, powerful natural forces," Legates said. "No efforts to stabilize the climate can possibly be successful."

Legates has also said that teaching children about climate change was an effort "to satisfy the climate change fearmongering agenda that pervades our society today."