Leaving the Paris Agreement would be Trump's worst move yet

The Trump administration is reportedly in the midst of a heated debate over whether to remain committed to the Paris Climate Agreement. (Cue "should I stay or should I go.")

That pact, which was negotiated in late 2015 and entered into force in November 2016, is the first global warming treaty ever devised to commit developing and industrialized nations alike to take steps to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. It is the culmination of more than three decades of dogged diplomacy on this issue, and abandoning it would be a bold and risky move.

If the administration chooses to exit Paris, or to submit the agreement to the Senate for a vote, which the Obama administration deemed unnecessary, it would risk fierce blowback on the international stage from friends and foes alike (not to mention outrage from the domestic climate movement).

It would be the international relations equivalent of pleading with all of your friends and enemies to gather in one room to work on a vital shared concern together.

Then, right after you reach agreement -- largely due to your own herculean efforts -- you let out an absurdly loud fart, the type of fart so loud that everyone knows you did it on purpose.

Then you throw a stun grenade over your shoulder, slam the door as you run out, step on a rusty nail and fall down a flight of stairs.

Via Giphy

You're left lying there, at the foot of the stairs, needing a tetanus shot, with several broken bones and a room full of newfound foes eager to retaliate against you for what you did in that room.

That injured person on the floor would be the Trump administration's foreign policy, were it to go through with a Paris Agreement withdrawal.

(It took a masters in foreign policy to be able to write that, I'll have you know.)

Seriously though, the U.S. is the second-largest emitter of greenhouse gases on the planet, and the biggest historical emitter -- meaning that we caused much of the global warming problem in the first place.

The entire world -- and I do mean the entire world -- is united on the need to tackle global warming. And we're thinking of turning our backs on the rest of the globe at the very moment when there is finally agreement on this issue.

In other words, that's messed up.

To hammer home that point further, here's a list of all the countries that would be further ahead of the U.S. in addressing climate change if Trump pulls the rug out from underneath the Paris Agreement. Each of them has already signed and ratified the Paris Agreement, meaning it is already in force for them.

You can bet these are also the ones that will be most ticked off by a U.S. withdrawal.

• Afghanistan

• Albania

• Algeria

• Antigua and Barbuda

• Argentina

• Australia

• Austria

• Azerbaijan

• Bahamas

• Bahrain

• Bangladesh

• Barbados

• Belarus

• Belize

• Benin

• Bolivia

• Botswana

• Brazil

• Brunei Darussalam

• Bulgaria

• Burkina Faso

• Cambodia

• Cameroon

• Canada

• Central African Republic

• Chad

• Chile

• China

• Comoros

• Cook Islands

• Costa Rica

Seriously folks this list keeps going.

• Cote D'Ivoire

• Cuba

• Cyprus

• Democratic People's Republic of Korea (aka North Korea)

• Denmark

• Djibouti

• Dominica

• Estonia

• European Union

• Fiji

• Finland

• France

• Gabon

• Gambia

• Germany

• Ghana

• Greece

• Grenada

• Guatemala

• Guinea

• Guyana

• Honduras

• Hungary

• Iceland

• India

• Indonesia

• Ireland

• Israel

• Italy

And going...

• Japan

• Jordan

• Kazakhstan

• Kenya

• Kiribati

• Lao People's Democratic Republic (aka Laos)

• Lesotho

• Lithuania

• Luxembourg

• Madagascar

• Malaysia

• Maldives

• Mali

• Malta

• Marshall Islands

• Mauritania

• Mauritius

• Mexico

• Micronesia

• Monaco

• Mongolia

And going...

• Morocco

• Namibia

• Nauru

• Nepal

• New Zealand

• Niger

• Niue

• Norway

• Pakistan

• Palau

• Panama

• Papua New Guinea

• Paraguay

• Peru

We're only on the letter "p." Are you getting the point yet?

• Poland

• Portugal

• Republic of Korea

• Rwanda

• Saint Kitts and Nevis

• Saint Lucia

• Saint Vincent and the Grenadines

• Sao Tome and Principe

• Saudi Arabia

• Senegal

• Seychelles

• Sierra Leone

• Singapore

• Slovakia

• Slovenia

• Solomon Islands

• Somalia

• South Africa

• Spain

• Sri Lanka

• State of Palestine

• Swaziland

• Sweden

• Thailand

• Tonga

• Tunisia

• Turkmenistan

• Tuvalu

• Uganda

• Ukraine

• United Arab Emirates

• United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland

• Uruguay

• Vanuatu

• Vietnam

• Zambia

Get all that?

Keep in mind that this is just the list of countries that have both signed and ratified the agreement. The roster of countries that have signed, but not yet ratified the agreement is even longer, representing just about every nation on Earth.

Officials celebrate the completion of the Paris Climate Agreement at the close of COP21 in Dec. 2015 outside Paris, France. Credit: Mori/AP/REX/Shutterstock

Leaving the agreement would abdicate U.S. leadership on a critical issue that will shape our future in ways that we haven't even fully grasped yet, from where our biggest cities are located to how much food we can grow.

It would also severely complicate the Trump administration's ability to solve a wide range of problems around the world. In addition, it would hand leadership on this issue, and on clean technology development, to China.

“There is a very high risk that there will be blowback from other countries on the rest of the Trump foreign policy agenda," said Andrew Light, a senior fellow at the World Resources Institute who served as a climate advisor at the State Department under President Obama.

He said the risk isn't so much that the U.S. delays its emissions cuts by a four-year Trump term, but rather that other countries, particularly major developing nations like India, Brazil and China back away from their pledges too.

For now, we're all still in that room. But the world is watching us closely.