Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that the Paris Agreement shall have no effect in the United States until it is renegotiated to ensure the world's largest emitters of greenhouse gases reduce their greenhouse gas emissions and receives the advice and consent to ratification of the United States Senate.

IV 117TH CONGRESS 1ST SESSION H. RES. 59 Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that the Paris Agree- ment shall have no effect in the United States until it is renegotiated to ensure the world’s largest emitters of greenhouse gases reduce their greenhouse gas emissions and receives the advice and consent to ratifica- tion of the United States Senate. IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES JANUARY 21, 2021 Mr. MCKINLEY (for himself, Mr. RESCHENTHALER, Mr. MOONEY, Mr. COMER, Mr. PFLUGER, Mr. ADERHOLT, Mr. LATTA, Mr. ROUZER, Mr. BARR, Mr. BUCSHON, Mr. BURGESS, Mr. KELLY of Pennsylvania, Mr. BANKS, Mr. JOHNSON of Ohio, and Mr. MOORE of Alabama) submitted the following resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Foreign Affairs RESOLUTION Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that the Paris Agreement shall have no effect in the United States until it is renegotiated to ensure the world’s larg- est emitters of greenhouse gases reduce their greenhouse gas emissions and receives the advice and consent to ratification of the United States Senate. Whereas, on May 9, 1992, the United States Senate provided its advice and consent to ratification regarding the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (‘‘Framework Convention’’), which entered into force on March 21, 1994; VerDate Sep 11 2014 22:10 Jan 22, 2021 Jkt 019200 PO 00000 Frm 00001 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6300 E:\BILLS\HR59.IH HR59 kjohnson on DSK79L0C42PROD with BILLS 2 •HRES 59 IH Whereas the Framework Convention was ratified under the express limitation ‘‘that a decision by the Conference of the Parties to adopt targets and timetables would have to be submitted to the Senate for its advice and consent’’; Whereas the Kyoto Protocol, completed at the 3d Conference of the Parties (‘‘COP’’) to the Framework Convention in December 1997 in Kyoto, Japan, contains emissions tar- gets and timetables, and was signed by President William Jefferson Clinton on behalf of the United States but never submitted to the Senate for its advice and consent to ratification; Whereas, on July 25, 1997, prior to President William Jef- ferson Clinton’s signing of the Kyoto Protocol, then-Sen- ator Joseph R. Biden, Jr., joined his colleagues in the Senate in unanimously passing the Byrd-Hagel Resolu- tion, which expressed congressional disapproval of any international agreement that did not require developing countries to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions and ‘‘would seriously harm the economy of the United States’’; Whereas the COP in Durban, South Africa, agreed to the Durban Platform for Enhanced Action, which charged the Parties with adopting a ‘‘protocol, another legal in- strument, or an agreed outcome with legal force’’ at the 21st COP; Whereas the Paris Agreement represents the COP’s most re- cent attempt to impose legally binding requirements on all parties to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, as envi- sioned by the Durban Platform; Whereas the Paris Agreement ‘‘and every article and clause thereof’’ was accepted by President Barack Obama on be- VerDate Sep 11 2014 22:10 Jan 22, 2021 Jkt 019200 PO 00000 Frm 00002 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6300 E:\BILLS\HR59.IH HR59 kjohnson on DSK79L0C42PROD with BILLS 3 •HRES 59 IH half of the United States solely through executive action, rather than submitted to the Senate for its advice and consent to ratification; Whereas 178 of the 196 parties to the Paris Agreement, other than the United States, believe it to be a treaty and have formally ratified it through their respective proc- esses; Whereas mere executive approval of the Paris Agreement does not give it any force of law in the United States and cannot be used to justify regulation; Whereas implementation of the Paris Agreement, absent the advice and consent to ratification of the United States Senate, would require pursuing unilateral and punitive regulatory policies harmful to United States economic competitiveness, including significant job loss, increased energy and consumer costs, risks to grid reliability, or any combination thereof; Whereas when originally negotiating the Paris Agreement, in- coming Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry stated, ‘‘if . . . all the industrial nations went down to zero emissions, it wouldn’t be enough, not when more than 65 percent of the world’s carbon pollution comes from the developing world’’; Whereas the Paris Agreement continues to treat the People’s Republic of China, the world’s second largest economy and largest emitter of greenhouse gasses, as a ‘‘devel- oping country’’, and therefore enables this nation to con- tinue to pursue energy and industrial policies that under- mine the economic interests of the United States and its citizens; VerDate Sep 11 2014 22:10 Jan 22, 2021 Jkt 019200 PO 00000 Frm 00003 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6300 E:\BILLS\HR59.IH HR59 kjohnson on DSK79L0C42PROD with BILLS 4 •HRES 59 IH Whereas to protect the interests of the United States and its citizens, prior to its submission to the United States Sen- ate for its advice and consent to ratification, the Paris Agreement should be renegotiated to ensure the People’s Republic of China and other of the world’s largest emitters of greenhouse gases, including the Republic of India and the Russian Federation, reduce greenhouse gas emissions at a pace and scale equivalent to that of the United States, members of the European Union, and other advanced nations; Whereas, between 1990 and 2018, global carbon dioxide emissions grew by 62 percent despite nearly 30 years of international climate agreements; Whereas the emissions reduction goals of the Paris Agree- ment cannot be met without the development and global deployment of affordable energy technologies, including storage, nuclear, and clean fossil technologies, as well as commercial-scale carbon, capture, utilization, and storage technologies; Whereas development and deployment of these technologies to meet the needs of nations striving to improve human wel- fare cannot take place under regulatory and legal regimes that stifle American economic growth and prosperity; Whereas the United States withdrew from the Paris Agree- ment, pursuant to the terms of the Agreement, which President Donald J. Trump first announced on June 1, 2017, and took effect on November 4, 2020; and Whereas, on January 20, 2021, President Joseph R. Biden, Jr., signed an Executive order to reenter the Paris Agreement: Now, therefore, be it VerDate Sep 11 2014 22:10 Jan 22, 2021 Jkt 019200 PO 00000 Frm 00004 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6300 E:\BILLS\HR59.IH HR59 kjohnson on DSK79L0C42PROD with BILLS 5 •HRES 59 IH Resolved, That it is the sense of the House of Rep- 1 resentatives that until the Paris Agreement is renegotiated 2 to ensure the world’s largest emitters of greenhouse gases 3 reduce their greenhouse gas emissions, submitted to the 4 United States Senate for its advice and consent to ratifica- 5 tion, and subsequently approved by the United States Sen- 6 ate exercising its article II responsibilities— 7 (1) the Paris Agreement shall not have the 8 force or effect of a treaty; 9 (2) none of its provisions are binding on the 10 United States in any way; 11 (3) executive emissions pledges made under the 12 Paris Agreement on behalf of the United States 13 shall have no effect and are not binding; 14 (4) the Paris Agreement cannot be used as the 15 legal basis for regulation; and 16 (5) Congress should refuse to consider any 17 budget resolutions and appropriations language that 18 include funding for the Green Climate Fund or any 19 affiliated body or financing mechanism. 20 Æ VerDate Sep 11 2014 22:10 Jan 22, 2021 Jkt 019200 PO 00000 Frm 00005 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6301 E:\BILLS\HR59.IH HR59 kjohnson on DSK79L0C42PROD with BILLS