As world leaders gathered in Brazil for this year’s global summit on the accelerating climate crisis this week, many took note of the absence of US President Donald Trump.

America’s president has not only once again pulled the US out of the Paris agreement, but also sought to turn climate denial into public policy and spent his term in office thus far grinding American investment in renewable energy to a halt—actions viewed as extraordinary abdications of responsibility at a time when the globe is ever more rapidly approaching the point of no return for warming.

Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who has emerged as one of the world’s leading climate defenders from the heart of the Amazon rainforest, began the conference by delivering an indirect but unmistakable shot at Trump. He denounced the “extremist forces that fabricate fake news and are condemning future generations to life on a planet altered forever by global warming.”

Other Latin American leaders were more direct. Colombian President Gustavo Petro, whom Trump recently hit with sanctions and threatened with military action, denounced the US president as “against humanity,” as evidenced by “his absence” at the conference.

“The president of the United States at the latest United Nations General Assembly said the climate crisis does not exist,” added Chilean President Gabriel Boric. “That is a lie.”

Even without Trump present, COP30 is crawling with fossil fuel lobbyists seeking to stymie progress. A report released Friday from the climate advocacy group Kick Big Polluters Out found that over 5,350 fossil fuel lobbyists have attended UN climate negotiations over the past four years. The corporations they represent are responsible for more than 60% of global emissions.