(HorizonPost.com) – President Biden’s Climate Czar John Kerry will be leaving the administration in the coming weeks to help the president’s reelection campaign, Axios reported.
The longtime Democrat senator and Barack Obama’s secretary of state was selected by Joe Biden shortly after the 2020 presidential election to serve as the incoming administration’s special envoy on climate.
A source close to the Biden administration told Axios that the 80-year-old Kerry believes that reelecting Joe Biden would make the “single biggest” difference for progress on the climate both at home and abroad.
During his time as Obama’s secretary of state, Kerry was instrumental in drafting the 2015 Paris Climate Accords. Biden’s decision to name him special climate envoy following his 2020 election victory was viewed as one of the ways Biden was keeping his campaign promise to address climate change more forcefully than previous administrations.
According to Axios, Kerry is currently working with White House Chief of Staff Jeff Zients on transitioning out of the administration and onto the Biden campaign before the spring.
Kerry met with the president in the Oval Office on January 10 where he expressed his gratitude and praised Biden for his record on climate change both domestically and globally, according to the source.
In a statement last Saturday, climate change activist Al Gore praised Kerry as “heroic” and lauded his “tireless work” in delivering progress on climate change, according to the Associated Press. The former vice president said Kerry approached the challenge “with bold vision, resolute determination, and the urgency that this crisis demands.” He said the world owed Kerry a “huge debt of gratitude.”
Kerry will continue as serving special climate envoy until the spring. He traveled to Davos, Switzerland this week as part of the US delegation to the World Economic Forum where he will expand the First Movers Coalition.
John Kerry served in the US Senate for 28 years. He was the 2004 Democrat presidential nominee. In 2013, he replaced outgoing Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in the Obama administration.
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