Washington governor and 2020 Democratic presidential candidate Jay Inslee said Wednesday that President Trump represents a national security risk because of his "willful ignorance" on climate change and his failure to start protecting military bases from sea level rise.

"He presents a clear and present danger to our national security because he is not responding to the threat of our military infrastructure," Inslee told reporters after his speech at the American Council on Renewable Energy in Washington, D.C. "This isn't about the polar bears. It's about our safety. His willful ignorance on climate change is endangering us all."

Inslee said Trump must be "removed from office" for the federal government to stem the dangers of climate change, which he said could cause the mass migration of people living in vulnerable areas across the world.

"We have to understand the president has to be removed from office if climate change is going to be dealt with," he said. "By him continuing that this is a 'Chinese hoax,' he has debilitated our ability to protect Americans."

The Trump administration is creating a panel to mount a challenge to the consensus on climate change and its impact on national security. National security and intelligence officials within the U.S. government have said that climate change threatens national security.

Trump's director of national intelligence, Dan Coats, listed climate change as a security danger in a worldwide threat assessment in January. That assessment stated, “Global environmental and ecological degradation, as well as climate change, are likely to fuel competition for resources, economic distress, and social discontent through 2019 and beyond.”

The Defense Department issued a report to Congress, also in January, that found climate change is a national security issue that could leave military bases vulnerable to coastal flooding and wildfires fueled by drought.

But Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said last week that climate change didn't rank in the top five of national security threats, and Trump has shown little interest in the issue.

"He is allowing our military bases to drown," Inslee said of the president.

[Related: 2020 candidate Jay Inslee says he can't defeat climate change unless filibuster and Electoral College go]