In an interview with “CBS This Morning” Friday, President Obama defended his view that the world’s greatest threat is not radical Islamic extremism, but climate change.
He argued that the consequences of global warming -- such as the oceans rising or major shifts in weather patterns -- will place people "under strain," making them more likely to adopt "dangerous" ideologies.
“We’re going to get ISIL,” said Obama. “They will be defeated. There will be ongoing efforts to disrupt the world order from terrorists, from rogue states, from cyber attacks… There’s always some bad people out there trying to do bad things and we always have to be vigilant in going after them.”
He went on:
But if you start seeing the oceans rise by five, six, seven feet -- if you see major shifts in weather patterns so that what had been previously bread baskets to the world suddenly can no longer grow food, then you’re seeing the kind of crisis that we can’t deal with through the deployment of the Marines. We can’t deal with it through throwing money at it.
What we know is that, as human beings are placed under strain, then bad things happen. If you look at world history, whenever people are desperate -- when people start lacking food, when people are not able to make a living or take care of their families -- that’s when ideologies rise that are dangerous.
When asked about criticisms made by Republicans in Congress and, specifically, GOP presidential hopeful Donald Trump, Obama said, “99.5% of scientists in the world say this is a really urgent problem.”
“The only people still disputing it are either some Republicans in Congress or folks on the campaign trail,” he fired.
Watch the interview below.