We are young people in the US making a strong call for climate justice in our communities. We are bringing our stories to COP24.

Last year, the U.S. pulled out of the Paris Climate Agreement, sending a clear signal to the rest of the world that our government does not care about our lives. We see this reckless decision making everyday within our country, with the continuous gutting of policies that protect people and the environment. The Trump administration has relentlessly threatened and harmed immigrants, indigenous peoples, low-income and working families, women and anyone on the margins of our society. Time and time again, policies from this administration seek to benefit corporations and the extremely wealthy at the expense of all of us.

Every year, the world’s countries gather together at the United Nations to try and “take collective action to address” the climate crisis. But we have seen them make false and empty promises over and over again by giving fossil fuel industries a seat at the negotiating table and by making weak commitments. The 2018 UN Climate Talks is a key moment for the global movement for climate justice. SustainUS will be there with stories of resilience, hope and solutions, making bold demands that challenge the innate unfairness of climate change.   

SustainUS delegates call out California's inadequate climate leadership at COP23 in Germany.

“There is no time more pertinent than now for US youth in the climate justice movement to bring our fullest creativity and brilliance to the UN, to show that we continue to fight on the ground for our communities and for the future we believe in, despite the inaction of our government.”

– Aneesa Khan, COP24 Delegation Co-Leader

This delegation will be guided by a vision of:

1. Resilience: Young activists have the capacity to create beauty, justice, ecological and community health and community empowerment even in spite of the political circumstances being so dire right now.

2. Reparations: The need for making amends and paying back historical and ecological debts of centuries of colonization and extractive capitalism to communities of color, indigenous communities, ecosystems and developing nations who are most impacted by climate change and have done the least to cause it.

We will spend December 3 – 14, 2018 in Katowice, Poland working in solidarity with people around the world who are making the same demands for climate justice – the stakes are high, and so is the opportunity.