Climate Change Report Author Rips Sanders’ Lies That Findings ‘Not Based On Facts’ Or ‘Data Driven’

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders on Tuesday sought to undermine the findings of a governmental report that warned of the impending consequences of climate change, claiming it’s “not based on facts” and arguing that modeling the climate “is never exact.”

The report, which was produced with the consensus of scientists from 13 federal agencies and 300 leading scientists, concluded that climate change will interrupt the way people live day-to-day and result in “hundreds of billions of dollars” in annual losses to some economic sectors without radical actions taken to immediately curb global emissions.

“We think that this is the most extreme version and it’s not based on facts,” Sanders told reporters at Tuesday’s White House press conference, the first in nearly a month. “It’s not data-driven. We’d like to see something that is more data-driven. It’s based on modeling, which is extremely hard to do when you’re talking about the climate.”

Trump also downplayed the report’s findings, telling reporters on Monday that he doesn’t “believe” its findings.

Katharine Hayhoe, an author of the bombshell report released on Friday, fired back at Sanders’ lies about the report, writing on Twitter: “First, a WH spokesperson said the report was based on the “most extreme” scenario. No: the report considered a very broad range of scenarios, from one where carbon emissions go negative to one where they continue to grow.”

First, a WH spokesperson said the report was based on the “most extreme” scenario. No: the report considered a very broad range of scenarios, from one where carbon emissions go negative to one where they continue to grow. Source: https://t.co/ibXllAEsxR pic.twitter.com/k6XoeNwGFr

— Katharine Hayhoe (@KHayhoe) November 27, 2018

She added, “Moreover, the scenarios chapter in Vol 1 discussed the scenarios in detail, and it concludes that ‘the observed increase in global carbon emissions over the past 15–20 years has been consistent with higher scenarios (very high confidence).’ ”

Moreover, the scenarios chapter in Vol 1 discussed the scenarios in detail, and it concludes that “the observed increase in global carbon emissions over the past 15–20 years has been consistent with higher scenarios (very high confidence).” source: https://t.co/ZUA5FhzXEi

— Katharine Hayhoe (@KHayhoe) November 27, 2018

The WH spokesperson also said that future reports would be “transparent” – but this report was publicly reviewed. Authors were required to respond to each comment individually, and both the commments + our responses are available for anyone to read. Plus …

— Katharine Hayhoe (@KHayhoe) November 27, 2018

Then, Santorum claimed us authors were “driven by money”. After I picked myself up off the floor laughing, since we received $0 for writing the report, I invited him to watch this entertaining Global Weirding episode. I don’t think he did; but you should! https://t.co/rPA74RgIEZ

— Katharine Hayhoe (@KHayhoe) November 27, 2018

…including the latest attribution studies for Harvey that quantify how human influence made the storm ~3x more likely and increased its rainfall “by at least 15% with a best estimate of 38%”. That’s pretty recent! Read more: https://t.co/ibXllAW3pp

— Katharine Hayhoe (@KHayhoe) November 27, 2018

When it comes to a changing climate, the bottom line is this:

It’s real.

It’s us.

Scientists agree.

The impacts are already here and now.

But by acting now we can still avoid the most serious and even dangerous impacts.

Our future is in our hands.

— Katharine Hayhoe (@KHayhoe) November 27, 2018