Greta Thunberg is on Capitol Hill this week to lobby lawmakers on environmental issues. If you don’t know Thunberg yet, you may want to put her on your radar. Today former President Barack Obama met with 16-year-old self-described climate activist, calling her “one of our planet’s greatest advocates.”
The Swedish teenager also met with a Senate climate crisis task force today. The Guardian writes:
Thunberg was one of several youth activists invited to address the task force during two days of action and speeches aimed at urging lawmakers to support “transformative climate action”. She was joined by activists from across the US and South America, part of a “multiracial, intergenerational” effort to combat climate change.
But she made it a point of saying that she doesn’t want talk from the Senate, she wants action.
Friday Thunberg will take her message to the streets helping lead a worldwide climate strike. Vox says:
The Global Climate Strike comes just before countries will gather at the United Nations for the Climate Action Summit on September 23, an event ahead of the UN General Assembly where countries are supposed to ramp up their ambitions to curb greenhouse gases under the 2015 Paris climate agreement. A second worldwide strike is planned for September 27.
Thunberg practices what she preaches. She made her two-week journey over to the United States on an emission-free racing yacht.