From THE DAILY CALLER
Nick Pope
Contributor
Texas Republican Senator Ted Cruz clashed with a group of climate activists who interrupted his speech at an event Thursday night.
Demonstrators sat on the stage next to Cruz and began chanting slogans, supposedly to draw attention to the issue of climate change and to protest Cruz’s position on energy, during Cruz’s speech at an event Thursday evening hosted by a conservative organization in Washington, DC Cruz . not backing down, instead of using the microphone to question the activists about their knowledge of basic climate and energy facts, a small clip of the incident was sent to the social media event.
“Go on, go on, which country is the biggest climate polluter on planet Earth?” Cruz asked the protesters. “You don’t understand. You are protesting and you don’t know what you are protesting. What’s the answer?” (RELATED: Eco-Activist Who Destroyed Stonehenge Says He Was Harassed By ‘Oil’ Singing American Bros)
WATCH
“OK, so you don’t have it,” Cruz said seconds later. “They’re literally protesting about the climate, and they can’t tell who is the biggest polluter on planet Earth. And they won’t.
One activist fired back at Cruz with a typically inaudible response in the footage.
“Which country is the biggest polluter on planet Earth today?” Cruz said, before one of the protesters said it was the US
“Okay, so this young woman doesn’t understand, say ‘United States of America,'” Cruz said. “They protest, and they don’t know. By the way, the answer is Communist China. Which country is leading the world in reducing carbon emissions? Do you know the answer? I’ll give you a hint, it was the wrong answer before: it’s the United States.
The crowd then began to applaud Cruz. (RELATED: ‘I Said’: Kamala Harris Laughs As Climate Demonstrator Shouts About Hawaii)
“Do you know why?” Cruz continued. “The reason is because of the thing you’re protesting: fossil fuels. No, no, you’re an idiot, you don’t understand. So if you’re going to protest, face some facts.
China is the world’s leading carbon polluter, according to The Carbon Brief, and the country is allowing an average of two new coal plants per week by 2022, according to the Center for Energy and Clean Air Research.
The US, meanwhile, is cutting carbon dioxide emissions by 17.5% between 2005 and 2022, according to Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) data. Many energy sector experts credit the natural gas boom of the late 2000s as the main driver of this reduction, as the cleaner and more affordable gas boom allowed the country to reduce its reliance on coal.
Between 2005 and 2022, US energy production from natural gas will roughly double as coal use declines, and US natural gas consumption will increase by about 46% over the same period, according to US Energy Information Administration data.
Cruz “will not be intimidated by climate protesters who ignore basic facts,” a spokesperson for the senator told the Daily Caller News Foundation.
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