President Trump Donald John TrumpBiden on Trump's refusal to commit to peaceful transfer of power: 'What country are we in?' Romney: 'Unthinkable and unacceptable' to not commit to peaceful transition of power Two Louisville police officers shot amid Breonna Taylor grand jury protests MORE is "actively making the problem worse" regarding Hurricane Florence by not addressing climate change as "a root cause of worsening storms," meterologist Eric Holthaus said during a Thursday night interview with MSNBC.

"You can’t really talk about this without talking about climate change," Holthaus told MSNBC's Chris Hayes. "We have some evidence that was published this week that the storm is actually a little bit bigger and the rain is going to be more intense because of warmer water."

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Holthaus serves as a columnist for Grist, a nonprofit environmental magazine.

He said hurricanes over the last few decades have had a tendency to move more slowly, which has led to them dropping more rain on specific locations once they hit land. He attributed this change to global warming in response to a question from Hayes about Hurricane Harvey.

"One of the things that happened with Harvey, which we saw, is that the slower moving the storm is, the worse it can be because it just stops and drops a lot of rain. Is that right?” Hayes asked Holthaus.



“Yeah, exactly. And we’re seeing that a little bit too in the last few decades that hurricanes are moving a little bit more slowly as they’re making landfall as weather patterns change in response to climate change," Holthaus replied.



"It’s gotten to the point where we have a president that is denying the impacts of this hurricane season last year and this year and actively making the problem worse by, you know, not addressing this root cause of worsening storms."

The Trump administration pulled the U.S. out of the Paris climate agreement in 2017, and Trump has worked to unwind regulations imposed by the Obama administration on coal-fired power plants that were intended to address climate change.

Trump argues the coal plant regulations and other executive decisions by Obama hurt the economy.

Hurricane Florence made landfall off the coast of North Carolina Friday morning and is expected to bring up to 40 inches of rain and massive flooding in some areas. More than 400,000 people have already lost power as of Friday morning.



Trump has been in continual contact with state leaders and declared a state of emergency on Tuesday for North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia.

State of emergency declarations make federal assistance available to bolster state and local response efforts.