France is enduring one of its most intense heat waves in decades, with temperatures exceeding 40°C (104°F), schools forced to close, and public officials urging people to stay indoors. Yet what caught my attention was not the weather itself, but the response from the French government. Instead of asking why millions of French citizens remain without air conditioning, politicians are effectively telling people they should simply learn to live with the heat.
After years of climate policies discouraging air conditioning, France now finds itself with only about 27% of homes and roughly 13% of apartments equipped with cooling systems, compared to well over 90% of homes in the United States. The public has had enough, with polls showing nearly 80% of French citizens now support expanding air conditioning in homes, schools, hospitals, and public transportation.
France’s Minister for Ecological Transition, Monique Barbut, said she was “horrified” by calls to install more air conditioning, insisting it should be reserved only for emergencies. Bureaucrats are more concerned with preserving ideology than allowing people to protect themselves. People should not be overheating to death in a developed nation.
Then came perhaps the most absurd comment of all. Paris Deputy Mayor Audrey Pulvar attempted to blame the United States for Europe’s heat wave, arguing that Americans bear “significant responsibility” because of their carbon emissions and widespread use of air conditioning. According to her logic, Americans cooling their homes are somehow responsible for French families suffering through extreme temperatures. Rather than asking why France spent years discouraging investment in reliable energy and practical infrastructure, politicians once again looked across the Atlantic for someone else to blame. That has become the standard playbook whenever government policy fails.
Marine Le Pen and the National Rally have called for a nationwide plan to equip schools, hospitals, nursing homes, and other public buildings with air conditioning, arguing that protecting people from extreme heat should take precedence over ideological objections. Meanwhile, much of France’s political left continues to portray widespread air conditioning as environmentally irresponsible, even as record temperatures expose the country’s lack of preparation. One side recognizes that governments have a responsibility to adapt to reality and protect their citizens. The other remains committed to climate doctrine, even when that doctrine leaves the elderly, children, and the most vulnerable suffering through dangerous heat because admitting they were wrong would undermine the entire climate agenda that has been pushed by the globalists for years.
I have said for years that climate change has become the perfect political tool because it allows governments to justify virtually any expansion of power. They tell farmers what they may grow, regulate fertilizer, attack livestock, close nuclear plants, restrict affordable energy, discourage air conditioning, and then claim these sacrifices are necessary to save the planet. Every crisis becomes another excuse for more regulation, more taxation, and more control over everyday life.
The Great Reset was never simply about reducing emissions. It is about changing the way people live. They want to dictate what you drive, what you eat, how you heat or cool your home, how much energy you consume, and ultimately how much of your standard of living you are willing to surrender in the name of climate. The people promoting these policies rarely live under the same restrictions. They fly private jets to climate conferences while telling everyone else that air conditioning has become a luxury.
France has spent years regulating and discouraging the installation of air conditioning in the name of climate policy. Strict building regulations have favored passive cooling measures over mechanical air conditioning, while environmental policies and energy-efficiency rules have made installation more costly and, in many older buildings, considerably more difficult. Now, as record heat places millions at risk, those same policies have left much of the population without one of the most effective tools for protecting themselves. This is what happens when ideology replaces common sense. Government believed it could regulate the climate by regulating how people cool their homes, and ordinary citizens are paying the price.