John Kerry, the US special climate envoy and former secretary of state and presidential candidate, will soon leave the Biden administration to join Joe Biden’s re-election campaign, his office announced.
A Kerry spokesperson told Reuters that he informed his staff on Saturday after meeting with Biden this week. Axios first broke the news about Kerry, 80, on Saturday.
Kerry helped negotiate the 2015 Paris Climate Deal and the UAE consensus on fossil fuel transition at Cop28 in Dubai last December. He thinks that Biden’s second term would be the “single biggest” factor for climate progress, Axios reported, citing a source close to the administration.
Kerry and Biden discussed this in the Oval Office this week, following Kerry’s attendance at the Cop28 summit in Dubai. The climate envoy wants to boost Biden’s climate agenda by playing a key role in the 2024 campaign, the outlet added.
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Kerry became the special envoy on climate after Biden defeated Donald Trump in the 2020 election and started building his team in November. The Biden transition team said Kerry would “fight climate change full time” and have a seat on the National Security Council, highlighting the urgency of addressing the climate crisis and global warming.
Kerry was Obama’s secretary of state, replacing Hillary Clinton, and led the global effort to forge the Paris Agreement, which aimed to cut greenhouse gas emissions and prevent catastrophic climate impacts.
A group tried to malify Kerry’s image
Kerry left the government in January 2017 when Trump took over and reversed Obama’s climate policies and withdrew the US from the Paris pact. Biden rejoined the accord as soon as he took office in 2021.
Kerry ran for president in 2004 and secured the Democratic nomination but lost to George W Bush, who won a second term. His campaign was hurt by a pro-Bush group that attacked his military service as a decorated Vietnam veteran who turned anti-war activist.
The group, Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, appeared in August 2004 when Kerry, a Democratic senator from Massachusetts, was leading the polls against Bush, who had only served in the Texas Air National Guard. The group tried to ruin Kerry’s image.
