Al Gore Compares 'Climate Deniers' to Uvalde Police: 'They Heard the Screams … and Nobody Stepped Forward'

Carolyn Kaster/AP

Former Vice President Al Gore compared the "inaction" of "climate deniers" to the police response at the deadly school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, during an interview Sunday on Meet the Press.

On May 24, 19 students and two teachers were killed by a gunman at Robb Elementary School. Video footage released earlier this month allegedly shows police waited 77 minutes to confront the shooter.

"You know, the climate deniers are really in some ways similar to all of those almost 400 law enforcement officers in Uvalde, Texas, who were waiting outside an unlocked door while the children were being massacred," Gore, 74, told Meet the Press host Chuck Todd Sunday. "They heard the screams, they heard the gunshots, and nobody stepped forward."

The acting police chief on the day of the Uvalde shooting, Lt. Mariano Pargas, was placed on administrative leave earlier this month amid a review of law enforcement's response to the tragedy. Uvalde School District Police Chief Pete Arredondo, whose response that day has also been criticized, was placed on administrative leave in June.

RELATED: President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Arrive in Uvalde to Pay Respects to Victims of Mass Shooting

"God bless those families who've suffered so much," Gore continued. "And law enforcement officials tell us that's not typical of what law enforcement usually does. And confronted with this global emergency, what we're doing with our inaction and failing to walk through the door and stop the killing is not typical of what we are capable of as human beings. We do have the solutions."

Gore, a longtime and urgent voice in favor of acting to combat climate change, said President Joe Biden has "taken quite a number" of "important actions" to promote those efforts but acknowledged that what he can do politically is limited by an evenly divided U.S. Senate.

"He's reversed some of the terrible policies of his predecessor," Gore said, referring to former President Donald Trump. "But [Biden] needs congressional action in order to take the bold steps that are really needed."

RELATED: UN Climate Chief Urges Leaders 'Not to Lose Focus' on Climate Change During 'Challenging Times'

In the 2006 documentary film An Inconvenient Truth, Gore warned of a "planetary emergency" due to global warming.

"Al Gore warned that we were going to experience rising temperatures, melting glaciers, drying lakes, more wildfires and stronger storms over the next 20 or 30 years. Well guess what? In the 16 years since that film debuted we've seen rising temperatures, melting glaciers, drying lakes, more wildfires in more states in this country and, yes, stronger storms," Todd said in introducing his guest. "We've experienced a lot of that in the last 10 days alone."

RELATED: Amid Deadly Heatwave, Al Gore Warns Atmosphere Could 'Get a Lot Worse'

Gore won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007 for his efforts to fight global warming.

In a separate interview on Sunday, Gore spoke about extreme weather — like the dangerous heat much of the country has experienced this summer — with Jonathan Karl on ABC News' This Week with George Stephanopoulos. "Scientists have predicted these extraordinary and catastrophic events for going on decades now," the former vice president said.

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"And the fact that they were dead right, maybe a little conservative even in their projections, should cause us to pay more careful attention to what they're warning us about now," he continued.

"They're saying that if we don't stop using our atmosphere as an open sewer, and if we don't stop these heat trapping emissions, things are gonna get a lot worse. More people will be killed and the survival of our civilization is at stake."