White House press secretary Josh Earnest speaks during the daily news briefing at the White House in Washington, Wednesday, Dec. 7. | AP Photo Earnest: 'Reality' could intrude on Trump's climate change views

White House press secretary Josh Earnest suggested on Thursday that President-elect Donald Trump — who has waffled on whether he believes in the widely accepted science of climate change — might change his tune once he takes office.

"The president has himself observed that it’s one thing to make grand pronouncements on the campaign trail, but once you enter the Oval Office and you’re responsible for managing the affairs of the United States and being leader of the free world, reality has a way of intruding,” Earnest said at his daily news briefing. “We'll see to what extent reality intrudes on some of the rhetoric that was used by the president-elect in the area of climate change.”


The press secretary noted that Trump has in the past written that climate change is a hoax perpetrated by the Chinese, a claim Earnest said “obviously is not substantiated by any kinds of facts or evidence or science.” But Trump has said more recently that he thinks there is some "connectivity" between human activity and global warming, and he met this week with former Vice President Al Gore, who has long championed climate change issues.

On Thursday, Trump gave perhaps his strongest indication yet as to which direction his administration will take on the environment, announcing Oklahoma Attorney General and vocal climate-change doubter Scott Pruitt as his pick to be administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. Trump has vowed to “cancel” the country’s participation in the landmark Paris agreement on climate change reached earlier this year.

Earnest also took the opportunity to note President Barack Obama’s successes on an array of climate change-related issues, including improvements in fuel economy that have not come at the expense of auto industry growth, an expansion of the renewable energy market, a reduction of carbon dioxide emissions amid a growing economy and a halving of U.S. reliance on foreign oil.

“These are benchmarks that are relevant to illustrating the progress we’ve made based on the strategy that President Obama has pursued,” Earnest said. “And given the fact that the president-elect has promised to pursue a different strategy, it’s worth comparing whether or not his strategy will yield results that are as good as what we’ve been doing.”

Pointing to China’s pledge to reduce its own carbon emissions, Earnest said “there are significant market forces that do counter the argument, that’s not rooted in science, that’s being made by the other side.” He added that protecting the environment need not be a partisan issue, nor does it necessarily come at the expense of economic growth.

“Plenty of social conservatives are quite interested in making sure that we’re good stewards of God’s creation,” he said. “And it turns out there’s a way to be good stewards of God’s creation even as we look for smart ways to grow our economy, and that’s exactly the strategy that President Obama has pursued.”