Petition To Remove Air Conditioning From State Department Has Over 1,800 Signatures

By Craig Boudreau

An online petition to remove all air conditioning from Department of State property has gotten more than 1,800 signatures since it was posted online Sunday.

A Change.org user named Hopalong Ginsberg created the petition in response to remarks made by Secretary of State John Kerry claiming air conditioning and refrigerants are as much of a threat to the world as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS). The petition garnered 1,869 signatures by Monday afternoon.

The petition states:

“WHEREAS, Secretary of State John F. Kerry has suggested that air conditioners are as big a threat as ISIS, and WHEREAS, it is the duty of our elected and appointed government officials to lead by example, THEREFORE, we call upon the U.S. Department of State to remove air conditioning from all property that the Department owns, rents, or otherwise employs, including but not limited to embassies, consulates, office buildings, etc., all vehicles owned and/or operated by the Department, and any other property, real or movable, owned, rented, or otherwise employed by the Department.”

“We were working together on the challenge of [the Islamic State], and terrorism,” Kerry said at a conference in Vienna on Friday regarding the Montreal Protocol, as reported by The Washington Examiner. “It’s hard for some people to grasp it, but what we — you — are doing here right now is of equal importance because it has the ability to literally save life on the planet itself.”

While there is no actual threshold which must be reached in order to elicit a White House response — an official White House petition made onpetitions.whitehouse.gov needs to obtain 100,000 signatures in 30 days before the White House will respond . The Change.org site boasts victories from its previous petitions.

Successful petitions from Change.org include granting burial rights in Arlington National Cemetery for female World War II pilots, naming a Staten Island ferry after a fallen Afghanistan war veteran, and even getting olympic gold medal diver Greg Louganis on the Wheaties Box.

ISIS has killed some 2,043 people in 29 countries since 2014, according to CNN. The Daily Caller News Foundation was unable to obtain the latest data on how many deaths have occurred globally from air conditioning to compare the two.

If successful, the petition will ultimately make its way to President Obama.

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