In late August, Greta Thunberg arrived in Coney Island after a fifteen-day transatlantic trip on an emissions-free sailboat. The 16-year-old Swedish climate-change activist has become internationally famous over the past year, leading students throughout Europe to stage school walkouts to demand that their governments do more to fight climate change. And she hasn't been shy about telling those governments that it shouldn't be up to her and other teenagers to be leading that fight. Referring to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, she told members of French Parliament earlier this summer, "It’s almost like you don’t even know these numbers exist. As if you haven’t even read the latest IPCC report, on which much of the future of our civilization is depending. Or perhaps you are simply not mature enough to tell it like it is. Because even that burden, you leave to us children."

Thunberg brought the same message with her to the United States. Since arriving, she's appeared on The Daily Show and in a short video with former president Barack Obama. But she saved her most damning, if measured, comments for her appearance before the Senate climate-crisis task force. Thunberg was one of several youth activists the task force invited to speak, with the aim of celebrating them for their work. As usual, Thunberg didn't mince words:

"Please save your praise. We don’t want it. Don’t invite us here to just tell us how inspiring we are without actually doing anything about it, because it doesn’t lead to anything. If you want advice for what you should do, invite scientists, ask scientists for their expertise. We don’t want to be heard. We want the science to be heard."

She added, "I know you are trying but just not hard enough. Sorry."

Massachusetts Democrat Ed Markey, the head of the task force and a co-sponsor of the Green New Deal, told Thunberg, "We need your leadership. Young people are the army politically, which has arrived in the United States. You put a spotlight on this issue in a way that it has never been before. And that is creating a new X factor.” He added, “We hear you. We hear what you’re saying, and we will redouble our efforts.”

Climate-change activists face frustrations everywhere, but the U.S. is uniquely challenging. While many other governments are slow or resistant to make necessary changes, even ones that have signed onto the 2015 Paris Agreement, the U.S. is the only developed country in the world where a major political party refuses to admit that climate change is real.

On Friday, September 20, Thunberg will be joining students in 150 countries in a global climate strike.