The International Maritime Organization (IMO), the UN-backed body that governs global shipping, decided in 2023 to adopt a "net-zero" policy that would mandate shippers remove as much CO2 gas from the atmosphere as they emit by 2050.
To encourage shippers in this vital endeavor, the UN wants the IMO to slap a "carbon tax" on the industry. This tax would not reduce greenhouse gas emissions by one single molecule. But hey! It's a "global emergency" after all, and everyone has to do their part, right?
Where is all that money from the carbon tax going? To new technology to scrub the atmosphere? If only. Instead, the proceeds from the tax will go to "developing" ("poor") nations to help them deal with bad weather.
In other words, it's just another idea to transfer massive amounts of cash to countries that don't have it. This global equity scheme has been part of the UN climate agenda since the beginning.
Donald Trump and the U.S. were having none of it.
Christiaan De Beukelaer, a senior lecturer in culture and climate at an Australian university, said “It would have marked the first-ever — and legally binding — carbon tax. This explains why petro-states including the United States tried so hard to scuttle the framework."
A State Department official told CNN, “Now we have a President who will always lead in putting America first and even worked to prevent consumers from around the world from paying higher prices as well.”
Administration officials argue the framework would give unelected international bureaucrats the power to tax U.S. companies and consumers while doing little to cut global emissions.
"This week, the UN is attempting to pass the first global carbon tax, which will increase energy, food, and fuel costs across the world. We will not allow the UN to tax American citizens and companies," Rubio wrote on X.
"This is a bigger deal than I think anybody realizes," U.N. Ambassador Mike Waltz said on Fox News.
Supporters counter that a uniform carbon price is the only way to push the shipping industry — responsible for nearly 3% of global greenhouse gas emissions — to meet net-zero targets by mid-century.
The U.S. pulled out all the stops to beat back this effort to tax the 90% of goods in the world that are shipped overseas. It was always nothing more than what the climate lobby thought would be, an easy smash and grab, transferring trillions of dollars from rich nations to poor nations in order to fund the poor nation's switch to clean energy.
How much of that cash would have ended up in the pockets of the kleptocrats running those benighted nations was never mentioned.
Trump threatened to retaliate against any nation that voted for the carbon tax on shipping. Some of those retaliatory measures, listed in the State Department press release, show that the U.S. was deadly serious about the tax.
In the U.S. statement, retaliatory measures against nations voting for the plan could include:
Blocking vessels from U.S. ports;
Probes and possible regulations over those nations’ anti-competitive practices;
Visa restrictions for vessel crews;
Penalties covering U.S. government contracts for new commercial ships and liquified natural gas terminals;
Additional port fees on ships owned, operated, or flagged by those countries;
Sanctions on officials sponsoring activist-driven climate policies.
“The United States will be moving to levy these remedies against nations that sponsor this European-led neocolonial export of global climate regulations. We will fight hard to protect our economic interests by imposing costs on countries if they support the NZF. Our fellow IMO members should be on notice.”
Other oil-producing nations also opposed the tax, as did China and India. We'll have to go through the whole ordeal again next year when the IMO has its annual meeting and the fight to adopt a global carbon tax on shipping will resume.
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