Sec. 2. Findings; sense of Congress
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Congress finds the following: In the second study of the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), issued in February 2022, the IPCC stated, based on scientific evidence, that the Earth’s climate is now changing faster than at any point in human and recent geologic history. The Sixth Assessment Report of the IPCC and the Fourth National Climate Assessment, issued in November 2018, found that a changing climate is— causing sea levels to rise; contributing to an increase in wildfires and temperature extremes in some parts of the world; contributing to an increase in heavy precipitation in certain locations; and intensifying drought in many regions of the world.
Forced displacement and forced migration are increasing in the context of environmental changes and climate-induced disruptions, including weather-related disasters, drought, food insecurity, and rising sea levels. In 2022, flooding events caused 6 out of 10 disaster displacements within countries, surpassing other types of disaster, according to the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre. Such events include— the weather phenomena affected by El Niño and La Niña, which have recently led to record levels of flood displacement in many countries, including Brazil, Nigeria, Sudan, South Sudan, and Somalia; high-impact events, such as the August 2022 floods in Pakistan, which displaced millions of people; and floods impacting the most marginalized communities, such as refugees, internally displaced persons, and returnee populations in northern South Sudan.
Sea level rise, both locally and globally, imperils low-lying communities around the world by threatening water supplies, accelerating coastal erosion and loss of arable land, and inundating coastal areas. This phenomenon affects— low-lying areas of countries, such as Bangladesh, are threatened with land erosion, land loss, salinization, and other effects of sea level rise and extreme weather events; and small-island-developing states, which are particularly vulnerable to sea level rise, which threatens their entire economies and territoriality.
Climate change is intensifying drought events and conditions in both severity and duration, which imperils agriculture and other livelihoods and can force families and communities to relocate temporarily or permanently. Failed rainy seasons in the Horn of Africa have led to the worst drought conditions on record in Somalia, Ethiopia, and Kenya. A 2022 World Food Program report on the Dry Corridor, a strip of land located in Central America that includes Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, and Nicaragua, has found that in the region— temperatures have been rising, with climate change projections for the Dry Corridor estimating an increase in temperature of up to 5.4 degrees Fahrenheit by 2050 and 10.8 degrees Fahrenheit by 2100; rainfall has been dwindling and becoming violently sporadic, with long-term droughts projected to become more severe by 2100 and intensifying by 27 to 73 percent across all months; crop failure is becoming rampant with the expected intensification of heat waves, which are expected to affect basic grains and coffee production due to forest fires, lags in sowing, and increased pests; and approximately 2/3 of the rural population of the Dry Corridor live in poverty and roughly 3/4 of these people are living in extreme poverty with significant levels of malnutrition, with the average monthly income from farming and other livelihoods estimated at $177.60 per person, leaving little room to cover eventualities linked to droughts, pests, extreme weather events, or socioeconomic shocks.
Tropical storms, including hurricanes, cyclones, and typhoons, are extreme weather events fueled by climate change that can generate widespread destruction and displacement. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration reported that 30 tropical systems were reported during the 2020 Atlantic hurricane season, making 2020— the highest-ever recorded Atlantic hurricane season; the fifth consecutive year with an above-normal Atlantic hurricane season; and 1 of the 18 above-normal seasons during a 26-year span.
The negative effects of hurricanes on communities can linger for years, as demonstrated by the lasting impacts on parts of Central America caused by Hurricanes Eta and Iota, which both made landfall in the same area in November 2020. Combinations of extreme heat and humidity may create wet-bulb temperatures that may render certain regions of the world uninhabitable in the coming decades. In the second study of the Sixth Assessment Report, issued in February 2022, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change affirmed with high-confidence that societal adaptations in the near term can help reduce the risks of climate change throughout the 21st century.
In the Synthesis Report: Climate Change 2023 , the IPCC concluded— There is a rapidly closing window of opportunity to secure a livable and sustainable future for all ; and Deep, rapid and sustained mitigation and accelerated implementation of adaptation actions in this decade would reduce projected losses and damages for humans and ecosystems . The United States bears a disproportionate responsibility for climate change since an estimated 1/5 of all historical worldwide carbon dioxide emissions were released in the United States, which is greater than the amount of such emissions released in any other single country.
In the Synthesis Report: Climate Change 2023 , the IPCC concluded, with high confidence, Vulnerable communities who have historically contributed the least to current climate change are disproportionately affected. . According to the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR)— 70 percent of refugees originate from countries on the front lines of the climate crisis; climate change affects people inside their own countries; and climate change typically creates internal displacement before it begins displacing people across international borders.
The Global Compact on Refugees recognizes that climate, environmental degradation and natural disasters increasingly interact with the drivers of refugee movements. . The October 2021 White House Report on the Impact of Climate Change on Migration— recommends that Congress should explore the need for additional protections for individuals who can establish that they are fleeing serious, credible threats to their life or physical integrity as a result of climate change ; and states [t]he United States should identify ways to apply existing protection frameworks in the context of climate change-related displacement and to identify gaps where the United States should forge new legal pathways to protection. .
As noted in a March 2023 report by the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants' International Refugee Assistance Project and the Human Security Initiative, many asylum seekers have cited the destruction of their homes, agricultural lands, and businesses due to climate-related causes as contributing to their decisions to flee, as these climate-related environmental disasters exacerbated their conditions of marginalization. The United Nations Human Rights Council has recognized that climate change poses an existential threat that has already negatively affected the fulfillment of human rights, specifically noting that— all States should, when taking action to address climate change, respect, promote and consider their respective obligations on human rights ; and the adverse effects of climate change are felt most acutely by those segments of the population that are already in vulnerable situations owing to factors such as geography, poverty, gender, age, indigenous or minority status, national or social origin, birth or other status and disability .
The effects of climate change also exacerbate social, economic, and political tensions within and among nations. The UNHCR Global Trends Report 2020 found, 95 percent of all conflict displacements in 2020 occurred in countries vulnerable or highly vulnerable to climate change. Disasters can also strike populations already uprooted by conflict, forcing them to flee multiple times, as was the case with [internally-displaced persons] in Yemen, Syria and Somalia and refugees in Bangladesh. .
Climate-vulnerable states experiencing protracted conflict, such as Afghanistan or Yemen, can be affected by multiple climate-related threats simultaneously, such as— drought and flooding events in Afghanistan; and drought, desertification, and cyclones affecting Yemen. In their 2022 report Migration as a Climate Adaptation Strategy USAID found— Migration has the potential to serve as an important adaptation and risk management strategy for climate-impacted populations ; Migration is not an adaptation strategy available to everyone due to pre-existing vulnerabilities, a lack of resources, or systemic inequalities ; and Voluntary and proactive migration can benefit migrants, their households, sending communities, and receiving communities.
Benefits include livelihood diversification, increased income and remittances, and knowledge and skills transfer. Receiving communities can benefit from an increased labor pool and an influx of migrant spending and support services. . The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights has suggested that a person displaced across borders due to climate related events— has the right to not be returned to a country where such person would have irreparable harm to their right to life; should be considered a victim of forced displacement; and should be granted at least a temporary stay in the country where they have found refuge.
Displaced individuals, including individuals affected by climate change, can seek protective stay in third countries through humanitarian pathways, family reunification processes, labor-based visas, and other complementary pathways with a humanitarian focus. Recognizing the human rights implications of climate change, countries have begun to explore humanitarian pathways for those displaced by climate-related environmental disasters, such as the Kampala Ministerial Declaration on Migration, Environment and Climate Change and Argentina’s recently announced humanitarian visa program.
A CARE International report, Evicted by Climate Change: Confronting the Gendered Impacts of Climate-Induced Displacement , which was published in July 2020, notes that— the climate crisis exacerbates gender inequality and makes it harder to achieve gender justice ; in 2018, more than half of the 41 million people internally displaced were women ; [p]oor women and children are up to 14 times more likely to be killed than men by a climate-fueled disaster, such as a hurricane, typhoon, cyclone, or flood ; and [w]omen who are displaced by climate change related impacts often have less access to relief resources .
Members of LGBTQ+ communities are disproportionately affected by institutional discrimination in the housing, employment, and health sectors, which reduces their capacity to cope with the impacts of climate change. Black immigrants and other immigrants of color face higher rates of displacement due to climate change, but are also more often discriminated against in immigration policies and systems. A December 2019 Oxfam International report found that climate-related events forced an estimated 20,000,000 people from their homes every year during the previous decade.
A 2021 national intelligence estimate from the National Intelligence Council, entitled Climate Change and International Responses Increasing Challenges to US National Security Through 2040 , predicted cross-border migration probably will increase as climate effects put added stress on internally displaced populations . A 2022 study by the Loss and Damage Collaboration found that an estimated 189,000,000 people in low income countries are impacted by extreme weather events exacerbated by climate change every year.
An October 2023 United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund study found that 43,100,000 children in 44 countries were displaced from 2016 to 2021 due to floods, storms, droughts, and wildfires. Ecological Threat Register 2020, which was published by the Institute for Economics & Peace— projects that climate-related threats will continue to cause significant displacement worldwide during the coming decades; and stated that 19 countries, with a combined population of 2,100,000,000 people, are most at risk for displacement given population growth, water stress, food insecurity, droughts, floods, cyclones, and rising temperature and sea levels.
It is the sense of Congress that the United States should— reduce its domestic greenhouse gas emissions on a scale and rate proportionate to its historical responsibility and in recognition of the urgency of the threat of climate change; welcome the shared responsibility of climate change adaptation, global disaster risk reduction, resiliency building, and disaster response and recovery; assist in providing durable solutions for climate-displaced persons; aid other countries in their climate change mitigation efforts; and work with the international community— to establish a framework to share the responsibilities described in paragraphs
(2)through (4); and to ensure that the human rights of climate-displaced persons are acknowledged, respected, protected, and fulfilled.