Jeff Bezos fund ends support for climate group amid fears billionaires ‘bowing down’ to Trump
Jeff Bezos fund ends support for climate group amid fears billionaires ‘bowing down’ to Trump
Concerns raised as $10bn Bezos Earth Fund halts funding for Science Based Targets initiative, which monitors companies’ decarbonisation
Summary
Jeff Bezos’s Earth Fund has ended its funding for the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi), a major climate certification group, raising concerns that billionaires are shifting away from climate action under Trump.
While Earth Fund claims the $18M grant expired as planned, critics argue political pressure influenced the decision.
Trump’s administration has cut climate mentions from federal sites and slashed green funding, prompting corporations to retreat from climate commitments.
Experts fear this signals a broader decline in green investment as Trump aggressively rolls back environmental initiatives.
They want lower taxes.
The super rich have only one goal - to become richer.
It always requires labor exploitation.
Sometimes to improve their public perception, their PR teams suggest philanthropy, which they then use for tax evasion.
Other times like now, they don’t give a fuck about public perception because the public has chosen racism and bigotry.
Billionaires 'bowing down' to Trump? Like they are reluctant? Like they aren't helping orchestrate this direction? Like they give a fuck about anything but their bottom line in the short term? Like this isn't an administration designed in plain view for billionaire interests, more so than any previous administration?
For real, that's phrasing is so ridiculous as to be hilarious if we weren't staring down the barrel of a loaded gun.
Not so much “bowing down;” more like “in cahoots with.”
I guess all of them standing right behind him at his coronation wasn't enough of a clue.
The rich aren't on our side...
But good luck prying neoliberals away from their teat
Neoliberalism has become an increasingly prevalent term in recent decades. It has been a significant factor in the proliferation of conservative and right-libertarian organizations, political parties, and think tanks, and predominantly advocated by them. Neoliberalism is often associated with a set of economic liberalization policies, including privatization, deregulation, depoliticisation, consumer choice, globalization, free trade, monetarism, austerity, and reductions in government spending. These policies are designed to increase the role of the private sector in the economy and society. Additionally, the neoliberal project is oriented towards the establishment of institutions and is inherently political in nature, extending beyond mere economic considerations.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoliberalism
I wasn't sure of what it really was. Basically, tech bros.
They change their label a lot, and I always get down voted for mentioning it.
But trump never would have been a candidate if it wasn't for Clinton de-regulating everything in the 90s in exchange for donations from literally trump and people just like him.
But yeah, they took credit for the dotcom boom and started the trend of billion dollar companies paying zero in tax, because it would "trickle down" by employees taxed on salary...
So yeah, they're the OG techbros basically.
They also took credit for crime reduction, saying it was due to their incredibly harsh sentencing guidlines, when it was the same reduction every other country got from banning leaded gas.
Neoliberal policy never worked, it just popped up when things were organically getting better. But the people from Bill and Hillary in the 90s are literally Biden/Kamala's people. Hell, Biden literally was one of them himself, he took credit for the crime bill even. They've had a death grip on the party for decades, and almost nothing they're doing actually helps people.
I'm hopeful Ken Martin breaks and takes the DNC back in a pro worker direction, but we'll have to see.
If Kamala had won tho, the neoliberals would still be running the party, because she would have gotten to name the chair.
What if instead of "bowing down", ALL of their DEI/nature/climate/... shit was always performative and meant as cheap PR while they privately couldn't give two flying fucks?
I expect that a lot of this isn't "bowing down to Trump", it's just people going "oh good, I can stop wasting money on initiatives I didn't really believe in without facing backlash over it."
Is this the same group that advocated for transitioning all schools and prisons to become 100% vegan, recognizing it to be an essential requirement to mitigate the climate catastrophe?
Tax billionaires based on wealth instead of income and no one would care how he spends his billions.
Shut up. Your ideas are dumb and will give everyone access to food.
Wait, that can't be right... Hold on.... - checks notes -
Oh okay, I get it now. Here we go!
Shut up. Your easily implemented "simple plans" would make universal healthcare easily accessible.
Huh... I know there's a good argument in here.... - thumbs through pages of notes -
Look, quit trying to make unchecked capitalism look bad by simply talking about it!
I'm no economist but I think anything after 1billion should stop being considered "property" of the CEO/owner that is able to be monetized and should have some legal differentiation that defines it as the sole property of the corporation for purposes of defining ownership.
Everyone argues that you can't force a billionaire to have to liquidate their wealth (stocks) because it will tank the company, even though they can leverage their stocks to fund their life, so they shouldn't be allowed to own that kind of wealth to begin with. The difference after 1billion should be considered a type of "ownership token" to keep the ownership of a company in the hands of the person that made the company/runs it until they decide to pass the ownership on to someone else.
Trump is just allowing Bezos to take the mask off. He doesn't need to pretend to care anymore.
Im so glad we just had the hottest January on record in the U.S. if we ignore climate change, surely it will just go away.
Can’t have climate change if you don’t record changing climates.
Ah, the stop testing so there's no covid anymore strategy!
Fear not! Billionaires are bowing down to Trump.
Fears? Fears? US Billionaires are playing sooooooooo nice with Trump and Co. so that they can get sweet sweet tax cuts tailored for them like in 2017.
Climate Stunt Arena