Justin Trudeau, the prime minister of Canada, met with US president Barack Obama on Thursday for the first official visit by a Canadian leader to Washington in 19 years, a diplomatic honour made possible in part by new pledges of cooperation on combating climate change.
Mr Obama and Mr Trudeau announced new commitments to reduce planet-warming emissions of methane, a chemical contained in natural gas that is about 25 times as potent as carbon dioxide and that can leak from drilling wells and pipelines.
In a joint statement, the leaders promised that their two countries would “play a leadership role internationally in the low carbon global economy over the coming decades.” As part of the announcement, US officials said they would immediately begin a new push to regulate methane emissions from existing oil and gas facilities, though finishing that process before the end of Obama’s tenure is unlikely.
Mr Obama and Mr Trudeau also pledged new co-operation in preserving the Arctic and focusing on biodiversity, science-based decision-making, indigenous people and building a sustainable Arctic economy. The two nations also promised to accelerate the carrying out of agreements made in climate talks in Paris last year.
The arrival of Mr Trudeau and his wife, Sophie Grégoire-Trudeau, has prompted comparisons to a similar visit in 1977 by Pierre Trudeau, a former prime minister and the current leader’s father. That visit made headlines when Margaret Trudeau, Pierre Trudeau’s wife, wore an above-the-knee dress to the White House state dinner.
While Canada and the United States have long been close allies, Mr Obama’s efforts to confront global warming had become a major point of contention with Mr Trudeau’s predecessor, Stephen Harper, who sought to aggressively expand Canada’s oil industry.
As Mr Obama became more determined to leave behind a lasting environmental legacy, he delayed and eventually rejected construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, which would have transported nearly a million barrels a day of heavily polluting oil from Alberta to refineries on the Gulf Coast.
Mr Obama’s rejection of the pipeline severely strained relations with Harper. But Trudeau’s election last year signaled a shift in policy that was welcomed by the White House. Mr Trudeau did not criticise Obama’s rejection of the pipeline, and Mr Trudeau has pledged to pursue an ambitious environmental agenda to coincide with Mr Obama’s policies.
Mr Obama joked at a news conference with Mr Trudeau that at every US presidential election Canadians “have to brace” for an influx of Americans who swear they’ll move to Canada if the other party’s candidate wins “but typically it turns out fine”.
The US president reacted with bemusement to a reporter’s question that he was being blamed for Mr Trump’s popularity in the Republican primary.
“I have been blamed by Republicans for a lot of things, but being blamed for their primaries and who they’re selecting for their party is novel,” he said.
The tone of US politics – from the belief among conservatives that compromise is “a betrayal” to politically advantageous “maximalist, absolutist positions” – was “creating an environment where someone like Donald Trump can thrive”, said Mr Obama. – New York Times