Gavin Newsom is in his glory this week, basking on the international stage at the world’s annual climate change conference, this time in Brazil, alone as the top representative from the United States.

It’s truly important that somebody high in office from this country attend this crucial gathering, given that climate change skeptic Donald Trump is loath to attend. And surely the other countries are glad to have the California governor in the northern Brazil city of Belém, near the mouth of the Amazon River.

Yet let’s also get a little real here. It’s not that Newsom has been that good at leading a climate change agenda back here at home. It’s that Trump is that bad.

Newsom basically gets to be our international spokesman by default, not on merit. And unchallenged in settings such as the conference in Brazil, he has an unfettered license to trash the likes of Trump while praising himself.

The governor said this about advancing international policies to combat climate change: “I cannot say that for the United States of America, particularly as it relates to the current occupant in the White House — quite the contrary — but the state of California has been a consistent partner for a half century and will continue to be for decades to come.”

On this score, the governor stands on the firmest of factual grounds.

The two Trump administrations have turned the U.S. from a reliable force to lower greenhouse gas emissions into a promoter of fossil fuel production. Leaks from his administration suggest that Trump will soon unleash a new wave of oil drilling off the California coast and elsewhere.

Trump, meanwhile, has made international cooperation with the U.S. on just about anything nearly impossible with his aggressive pro-tax crusade by raising tariffs and intensifying our trade conflict with China.

California, on the other hand, has consistently advanced policies to combat the warming planet, from setting future targets to reduce emissions to phasing out gas-power automobiles.

California is lagging on key climate goals

Yet when it comes to true deeds during the Newsom years, rather than words, our governor is getting a big pass in Brazil.

While the state’s emissions are dropping, California is not on track to meeting its own future targets, such as net-zero emissions by 2045. And when we calculate our emissions, we don’t count those caused by wildfires that are made much worse by climate change.

Newsom has not placed the state’s public transportation system on solid fiscal ground as its finances have not recovered from the ridership losses of the COVID pandemic era. The San Francisco Bay Area, for example, hasn’t resolved how to fund its rail system.

And then there is high speed rail.

Newsom was sitting on a $100 billion budget surplus and a rare moment to make historic progress on building a line that eventually is supposed to connect Los Angeles to the Bay Area. But instead, he banked on President Joe Biden to provide most of the remaining funds in his second term to finish the first 171-mile leg from Merced to Bakersfield.

And we all know how well that plan worked out. Now Newsom’s plan is to dribble out funding for this rail project, a billion dollars a year for 20 years, as if that’s the way to fund a massive capital project.

Down in Brazil, plans are underway to start construction of a 220-mile line connecting the country’s two largest urban centers, Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo, at half the cost of the unfinished line in the San Joaquin Valley. Brazil hopes to finish this project by 2032.

We should all want California to truly lead on this issue. But this isn’t a moment for Newsom to take credit for a mission being accomplished. It’s time to eat some humble pie to prepare for tough choices that lie ahead.

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