Our investigation shows: Trump is effectively engaging in climate and weather terrorism

It doesn’t begin with a thunderclap. It begins with silence. With the voice that no longer warns. With the data that no longer arrives. With weather services standing empty. And it ends with water in the streets, with houses collapsing, with people who were not evacuated in time because there was no one left to tell them they had to go. As the United States moves toward a future that is hotter, more unpredictable, more dangerous, the government under Donald Trump is dismantling the protective mechanisms that were built up over decades – through research, experience, and a sense of responsibility. Observers call it the dismantling of the state. The government calls it efficiency. But what President Trump and his Republican allies in Congress are currently carrying out goes far beyond cutting budgets. It is a systematic gutting of the institutions that were designed to make sure a nation doesn't get left out in the rain – literally. The National Weather Service has lost hundreds of positions in recent months. On the very day the Guadalupe River overflowed, the San Antonio office was missing its lead coordination meteorologist – the person who liaises with local authorities, plans evacuations, and sets alert levels. He was gone. Early retirement, offered by a government that would rather pay professionals to leave than to stay.

More than 672 staff members (as of July 13, 2025) have been cut from the Weather Service. Nearly half of all regional offices have lost over 300 employees, and some offices no longer operate at night. Weather balloons are now only sporadically launched. “We are preparing for degraded operations,” the service itself says – a euphemism for what is essentially a breakdown of function. And it doesn’t stop there. Ten NOAA laboratories – the agency responsible for weather and ocean research – are to be shut down. NOAA currently operates around 21 major research laboratories, including the Hurricane Hunter center in Miami, whose planes used to fly into storms to measure wind speed, temperature, and humidity – exactly the data needed to save lives. What is being lost here is a “generational loss” for forecasting research. But President Trump apparently sees no harm in any of this. His budget proposal cuts another two billion dollars from NOAA – 27 percent. The agency’s scientific division is to be eliminated entirely. Satellites that have been monitoring the atmosphere and oceans for decades are being decommissioned. NASA’s Earth observation will be cut in half. What remains is a country flying blind. A country that refuses to look – while the storm has already begun.

Yet as this scientific retreat unfolds in plain sight, Europe remains strangely silent. Hardly anyone seems to notice that the consequences will be felt on this continent too – and not in the distant future, but during the next storm season, the next river flood, the next drought. Europe’s early warning systems, the ECMWF weather models, the Copernicus satellite program – they all depend on the continuous, high-resolution data stream from the United States. Without the Hurricane Hunter flights, without NOAA satellites, without U.S. river gauge and ocean data, European forecasts will also become less accurate, reaction times longer, protective measures weaker. Trump’s destruction of the American climate infrastructure is not an isolated domestic experiment – it is a global assault whose full force will only become visible once it’s too late. And Europe? Europe remains silent – and will soon be standing in the rain. This is a destructive restructuring that does not happen by accident but with full intent – coldly calculated, ideologically driven, and carried out by a government that views science as the enemy and nature as disposable. With renewed force, Trump is promoting coal plants, allowing entire forests to be cleared for industrial megaprojects, lifting emission limits, and pushing the EPA systematically to the edge of collapse. The result is a double catastrophe: while the physical foundations of climate security are being destroyed, climate change itself is being accelerated. It is not just negligence – it is the active sabotage of the future.

Even emergency response itself is being gutted. FEMA, once the backbone of America’s crisis response, is being shaken to its core. Trump doesn’t want to reform it – he wants to eliminate it. Already, 3.6 billion dollars in promised aid funds have been frozen. No new money for house reinforcements in hurricane zones, no budget for the resilience program “Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities,” which totaled 882 million dollars. In the last six months, FEMA has lost 2,000 of its 6,800 full-time employees. 18 of the 61 coordinating officers who lead disaster responses are gone. The head of the disaster command center? Vacant. The chief of the agency: a man with zero experience in disaster management. And the US Geological Survey has not been spared either. Its river gauge networks, which collect water level data every 15 minutes, are to be cut by a fifth. 25 research facilities are losing their leases – this affects virtually the entire national infrastructure. The alternative? Those who can pay will still get information. Those who can’t? Will be left in the water. At a time when the US faces an average of 27 billion-dollar disasters per year, the government is cutting the future out of the budget. A policy of unlearning. A government that abandons weather forecasting and climate protection – because it doesn’t trust either prediction or reality.

Climate and weather scientists, journalists, and activists often seem like voices crying out in the desert – ridiculed, ignored, or brushed aside. They are fighting a windmill that spins faster with every political decision. And the bitter truth is this: even those most directly affected – people in flood-prone areas, families in overheated cities, farmers without water, society as a whole – often remain passive or look away. Public support is shockingly low, especially where it is needed most. The greatest indifference often reigns in the middle of the storm. What remains is a country without early warning systems or sustainability. Without coordination. Without a plan. What remains is a country where the water and the heat are rising – and no one is left to say when it’s too late. Tragically, hardly anyone notices. Except the dead.

If independent, fact-based reporting matters to you, you can support our work directly. We do not run ads, we are not backed by corporations – we fund ourselves and rely on people who value what we do. Your contribution helps us pursue investigations, access court records, and sustain serious journalism. Thank you.