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For Immediate Release
September, 20 2023, 02:24pm EDT
Contact:
Valentina Stackl, valentina@priceofoil.org
Key Countries Responsible for the Climate Crisis Fail to Answer Call to Phase Out Fossil Fuels
NEW YORK
In a display of inaction and indifference, the handful of rich countries driving oil and gas expansion failed to answer United Nations Secretary General António Guterres’s call for an end to new fossil fuel production. Lacking the climate leadership necessary to participate, the United States, the United Kingdom, Norway, and Australia were excluded from speaking at the Climate Ambition Summit today. Canada, while allowed to speak, did not contribute any significant phaseout plans apart from recommitting to end its international public finance for fossil fuels. These countries, with the greatest financial means and responsibility to lead a fast and fair global phaseout of production, are instead leading in jeopardizing the global 1.5ºC goal.
In a display of inaction and indifference, the handful of rich countries driving oil and gas expansion failed to answer United Nations Secretary General António Guterres’s call for an end to new fossil fuel production. Lacking the climate leadership necessary to participate, the United States, the United Kingdom, Norway, and Australia were excluded from speaking at the Climate Ambition Summit today. Canada, while allowed to speak, did not contribute any significant phaseout plans apart from recommitting to end its international public finance for fossil fuels. These countries, with the greatest financial means and responsibility to lead a fast and fair global phaseout of production, are instead leading in jeopardizing the global 1.5ºC goal.
The Summit comes in the wake of historic global mass mobilization to end fossil fuels. Over 600 000 people on all seven continents took action, culminating in a 75 000-person march in New York City, sending a clear message to U.S. President Joe Biden to stop the expansion of and phase out fossil fuels. The recently released “Planet Wreckers” report exposed these five Global North countries — the United States, Canada, Australia, Norway, and the United Kingdom — are responsible for 51% of carbon dioxide pollution threatened by new oil and gas extraction between 2023 and 2050. If these Planet Wreckers were to heed the United Nations Secretary General’s call to halt new oil and gas, we could prevent a staggering 100 billion tonnes of carbon pollution from entering our atmosphere, equivalent to the lifetime emissions of over 620 new coal plants. In contrast, countries like Chile, Denmark, France, and Tuvalu were invited to speak at the Summit, as they have halted fossil fuel expansion and financing as needed to align with 1.5ºC.
The Climate Ambition Summit was intended to be the last high-profile gathering for countries ahead of COP28 and an opportunity to present new climate plans and policies to shift away from fossil fuels. Now, with 10 weeks left before Dubai, global leaders must answer the urgent call to stop the biggest driver of the climate crisis before it’s too late.
Romain IOUALALEN, Oil Change International Global Policy Manager, said:
“The rich countries that have historically driven the climate crisis and are continuing to expand fossil fuels were given an opportunity by United Nations Secretary General António Guterres to demonstrate their commitment to the 1.5ºC global warming limit. Instead, we saw cowardice and a staggering failure of climate leadership. The United States, Canada, Australia, the United Kingdom, and Norway, responsible for a majority of planned oil and gas extraction, either arrived empty-handed or failed to attend altogether. This is a slap in the face of the more than 600 000 people who marched on all seven continents last weekend. A slap in the face of science. A slap in the face of the people displaced and dying from escalating climate catastrophes. As wealthy nations shirk their responsibilities, real leadership comes from people and countries least responsible for and most affected by the climate crisis. World leaders must finally find the courage to agree to the end of the fossil fuel era at COP28 in Dubai, before it’s too late.”
Allie Rosenbluth, Oil Change International United States Program Manager, said:
“Last weekend 75 000 people joined together in the streets of New York City ahead of the UN Climate Ambition Summit to demand President Biden meet the Summit’s expectations by stopping fossil fuel approvals and developing a plan for an equitable phaseout. Instead, Biden failed to meet the basic bar for climate leadership and isn’t here. The United States is the largest oil and gas producer and largest historical climate polluter, accounting for over one-third of planned global oil and gas expansion through 2050. Biden has also broken promises to stop propping up fossil fuels with public money internationally, approving a total of USD 1.5 billion for four projects so far this year. If Biden wants to be the ‘climate president’ he claims to be and protect those most impacted by the climate crisis and environmental injustice, the first step is to get serious about ending fossil fuels.”
Oil Change International is a research, communications, and advocacy organization focused on exposing the true costs of fossil fuels and facilitating the ongoing transition to clean energy.
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Columbia Students and Faculty Arrested at 'ICE Off Campus' Protest in NYC
Protest organizer Sunrise Movement said the school's “Columbia’s original collaboration with ICE and the Trump administration set the stage for the ICE raids and extrajudicial murders that are now terrorizing communities nationwide,” said protest organizer Sunrise Movement.
Feb 06, 2026
A dozen people were arrested Thursday after Columbia University students and professors blocked a major intersection in Upper Manhattan to demand that the Ivy League school declare itself a sanctuary from federal immigration enforcers.
The Columbia chapter of Sunrise Movement—the youth-led climate campaign—organized the protest, which drew more than 150 people on a subfreezing afternoon to condemn US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and what they say is the university's cooperation with the Trump administration.
“Columbia’s original collaboration with ICE and the Trump administration set the stage for the ICE raids and extrajudicial murders that are now terrorizing communities nationwide,” Sunrise Columbia said in a statement following the protest.
A smaller group of protesters blocked the intersection of Broadway and 116th Street, site of the main entrance to the Columbia campus in Morningside Heights, at around 3:00 pm Thursday, according to the Columbia Spectator. Activists sat in a crosswalk wearing matching shirts reading "Sanctuary Campus Now" as chants of "No ICE, no KKK, no fascist USA!" and "When immigrants are under attack, what do we do? Stand up, fight back!" echoed through the air.
RIGHT NOW, Columbia University students & faculty demand a sanctuary campus. ICE OUT OF NYC. ❤️🔥 pic.twitter.com/zaLbor8EJf
— Columbia Palestine Solidarity Coalition (CPSC) (@Columbia_psc) February 5, 2026
“It’s very meaningful for faculty and students to take action alongside each other and even get arrested alongside each other,” Columbia student Adeline Sauberli told the Spectator. “I think it’s a message of hope, almost, that you know the core of the Columbia community, the students and faculty who are in classrooms together and talking about ways that the world can be better are also willing to take to the streets and say that we shouldn’t have ICE here.”
Columbia Teachers College adjunct professor E.Y. Zipris told the Spectator that “if I was to really continue to respect the university, then I have to join in with those who are fighting to remind Columbia of how it’s supposed to be."
“For faculty to put themselves in this position where they will be handcuffed and led into an awaiting van and then driven downtown is a tremendous statement of calling out the institution, the board of trustees, and everybody involved, saying, ‘Our students are more important to us than caring for, in this moment, our own actual well being,’" Zipris added.
New York Police Department (NYPD) officers began arresting the protesters blocking the intersection after issuing warnings to disperse. The New York Times reported that the arrests were "calm and deliberate," a "marked contrast from the overwhelming show of force and rows of riot police that often met protesters outside Columbia during the past two years" of protests against the US-backed Israeli genocide in Gaza and Columbia's complicity in the slaughter.
US police arrested 12 anti-ICE protesters at Columbia University in New York. The demonstrators accuse the university of cooperating with immigration enforcement agents and are demanding the campus be declared a sanctuary.
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— Al Jazeera English (@aljazeera.com) February 6, 2026 at 2:07 AM
Organizers of Thursday's action accused Columbia's board of trustees of complicity with the Trump administration's deadly immigration crackdown, pointing to ICE's arrest of former Columbia graduate student and Gaza protest organizer Mahmoud Khalil, a legal permanent US resident who was abducted last March by ICE agents in front of his pregnant wife and jailed without charge or trial in Louisiana before being released in late June.
Other Columbia students who took part in Gaza protests, including green-card holders Mohsen Mahdawi and Yunseo Chung and Palestinian Leqaa Kordia, were also arrested last year.
According to the Spectator:
Protesters called on the university to stop sharing student, faculty, and staff information with the Department of Homeland Security and other law enforcement agencies; remove members of the board of trustees who have “enabled the Trump administration’s repression of noncitizens"; end the surveillance and discipline of students for political activity; and clarify how the university has implemented its $221 million agreement with the Trump administration.
“Over the past two years, we’ve seen Columbia violently suppress student speech exposing Columbia’s complicity in ongoing genocide in Palestine,” student organizer Cameron Jones told the New York Daily News. “By suspending, brutalizing, and facilitating the kidnapping of their students, the university has made clear that there is no line it will not cross in service of genocidal regimes.”
BREAKING: Columbia students and faculty are blocking the road to demand Columbia become sanctuary campus.That means ending collaboration with ICE's kidnapping of students and workers.
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— Sunrise Movement (@sunrisemvmt.bsky.social) February 5, 2026 at 1:33 PM
Columbia University denies that it worked with ICE to arrest students, saying in a statement that it "supports the right of individuals to peacefully protest. However, claims made against the university during today’s protest activity, which took place outside of our gates, are factually incorrect."
Arrestee Jennifer Hirsch, a professor at Columbia's Mailman School of Public Health, told the New York Times that “Columbia was the test case for this government strategy of kidnapping people first and then asking questions later."
In a separate interview with the Spectator, Hirsch said that “it says in the Torah, be kind to the stranger for you are a stranger in a strange land and that was actually in my bat mitzvah Torah portion, and so I’m just responding to what to this moment asks of all of us."
“I think history will judge us for what we do at this moment,” Hirsch said. “It’s scary and dangerous but it’s more scary and dangerous to have masked agents come to your door, break down your door, and kidnap you.”
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Sweeping Coalition Backs AOC-Sanders Bill to Cap Credit Card Interest Rates at 10%
"Working families continue to struggle with unprecedented credit card debt and deserve to see Congress take legislative action to address this growing crisis."
Feb 06, 2026
As polling continues to show US consumers are pessimistic about an economy in which they face rising costs for everything from groceries to healthcare and housing under President Donald Trump, a "historic and diverse coalition" this week called on Congress to pass a bipartisan bill that would cap credit card interest rates at 10%.
The current average credit card interest rate is nearly double that, at 19.61%, according to Bankrate. It was even higher, over 20%, when US Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) introduced the bill a year ago. Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) lead the legislation in the House of Representatives.
Their push came in response to an unfulfilled pledge from Trump, whose campaign said in September 2024 that he "has promised to cap interest rates at 10% to provide temporary and immediate relief for hardworking Americans who are struggling to make ends meet and cannot afford hefty interest payments on top of the skyrocketing costs of mortgages, rent, groceries, and gas."
The Thursday letter to congressional leaders—signed by dozens of civil rights, consumer protection, labor, veteran, and other groups—points to that promise, as well as Trump's January social media post calling for a one-year 10% cap. It also notes that "in response to widespread Wall Street opposition to the president's recent announcement, Trump officials have begun to backtrack—instead promoting 'Trump Cards' that banks could voluntarily offer with temporary 10% interest rates."
"While the Trump administration appears to be twisting itself into knots to appease Wall Street bankers, working families continue to struggle with unprecedented credit card debt and deserve to see Congress take legislative action to address this growing crisis," the coalition stressed. "We urge your offices/committees to advance these bipartisan bills immediately and make this policy a reality."
Illustrating the need for the policy, the letter states that "Americans owe $1.21 trillion in aggregate credit card debt," "groceries now make up the majority of credit card purchases for most Americans," and "older Americans are charging everyday purchases like gas, food, healthcare expenses, and even utilities on their credit cards."
"Not only are more Americans having to lean on their credit cards to make ends meet, but more are falling behind. Today, more than 12% of credit card debt is 90 days or more past due," the letter continues. "As Americans find themselves deeper in debt, credit card companies have been raking in record profits."
The federal bill would "save families $100 billion per year and provide interest savings of $899 per person on average per year," but also "not restrict most Americans' access to credit—directly refuting common banking lobbyist talking points," the coalition explained, citing research from Vanderbilt University. "Instead, banks would absorb the rate cut through a combinationof reduced profits, reduced advertising expenses, and reduced rewards to customers with lower credit scores (who would benefit more from the rate cuts)."
It also cites a recent analysis by the letter's lead group, Protect Borrowers, showing that "credit card delinquency rates in states that President Trump won are nearly 5 percentage points higher than in other states—with states like Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, Arkansas and South Carolina having the highest credit card delinquency rates."
When big banks charge 24% or 30% interest on credit cards, they are not engaged in the business of "making credit available." They are involved in extortion and loan sharking.Yes, we need to cap credit card interest rates at 10% and stop Wall Street from ripping off Americans.
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— Senator Bernie Sanders (@sanders.senate.gov) February 2, 2026 at 4:36 PM
"By providing billions of dollars in economic relief to working families, this legislation directly responds to the promises that candidate Donald Trump made to the American people last year," the groups wrote. "Recent polling has found that it is also incredibly popular by a jaw-dropping 8-to-1 margin among American voters across all political parties, spanning age, gender, race, and education level."
"It is clear: the American people support policymakers taking action to address the growing credit card crisis that is drowning millions of American families across the country in debt," the coalition concluded. "We stand ready to work with your offices to ensure that this bill becomes law and that working families get the economic relief they were promised and deserve."
Sanders and Hawley have similarly highlighted Trump's calls for the 10% rate cap in Fox News op-eds pushing for their legislation. In a Monday piece, Sanders wrote that "when Wall Street's greed and recklessness brought the economy to the verge of collapse in 2008, causing millions of Americans to lose their homes, jobs, and life savings, the taxpayers came to the rescue."
"The Federal Reserve gave these huge banks trillions of dollars in emergency loans at virtually zero interest. We bailed out the banks," he added. "Now it's time for Congress to stand with working families, end Wall Street greed, and pass legislation that caps credit card interest rates at 10%."
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Death Toll Up to 128 People as Trump Pentagon Commits Two More Killings at Sea
"They killed more than 127 people aboard boats, in 33 attacks, in five months," said one analyst. "And the amount of cocaine found at the US land border keeps increasing."
Feb 06, 2026
Just over a week after the families of two Trinidadian men sued the Trump administration over the boat bombings that killed their relatives, the US Department of Defense killed two more people in the eastern Pacific Ocean, bringing the total death toll to at least 128 in the White House's operation that it claims is targeting drug traffickers.
The US Southern Command said in a social media post that at the direction of Cmdr. Gen. Francis L. Donovan, "Joint Task Force Southern Spear conducted a lethal kinetic strike on a vessel operated by designated terrorist organizations."
As with the other dozens of strikes the Pentagon has carried out in the Pacific and the Caribbean Sea since September, Southern Command did not provide evidence for its claim that "narco-terrorists" were killed in the attack or that the vessel was traveling "along known narco-trafficking routes in the Eastern Pacific and was engaged in narco-trafficking operations."
The White House has persistently claimed that the boat strikes are aimed at stopping drug cartels based in Venezuela from sending drugs to the US, but international and domestic intelligence agencies have not identified Venezuela as a major player in the trafficking of illicit substances—particularly not of fentanyl, the leading cause of overdoses in the US.
President Donald Trump has claimed the US is in an "armed conflict" with drug cartels. Members of Congress from both sides of the aisle have unsuccessfully sought to pass war powers resolutions to stop the administration from attacking vessels and targets in Venezuela.
Dozens of strikes preceded the Trump administration's invasion of Venezuela and abduction of President Nicolás Maduro, whom the White House has accused of being directly involved with drug trafficking. Since attacking Venezuela, though, administration officials have all but admitted their goal in the South American country is to take control of its oil supply.
The killings of nearly 130 people in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific have been denounced as extrajudicial "murders" by numerous legal experts, and a top military lawyer at the Pentagon warned officials in August, weeks before the operations began, that carrying out the strikes could expose military top brass as well as rank-and-file service members to legal liability.
In the case of at least one bombing in September, the official who oversaw the strike told Congress that the boat was found to have been headed to Suriname, not the United States. One vessel had turned back toward Venezuela, away from the US, when it was struck.
The strike on Thursday was announced soon after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth claimed that "some top cartel drug-traffickers... have decided to cease all narcotics operations INDEFINITELY due to recent (highly effective) kinetic strikes in the Caribbean.” Hegseth did not provide evidence for the claim.
Adam Isacson of the Washington Office on Latin America emphasized on Thursday that after killing more than 127 people in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific, the administration has nothing to show for the operation but "a collection of gruesome videos" of the bombings.
"The amount of cocaine found at the US land border keeps increasing," he said, citing Customs and Border Protection statistics.
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