Joe Biden's climate legacy at stake after backlash over Willow oil project

When Elise Joshi was at the White House last year, her eyes welled with happy tears as President Joe Biden hosted thousands of supporters to celebrate groundbreaking legislation targeting climate change.

"In that moment, I felt a lot of hope that the administration was listening to us," said Joshi, a California college student who is a leader of Gen-Z for Change, a coalition of young activists on social media.

Now Joshi is planning to return to Washington, but for a very different reason. She's outraged that administration officials approved the Willow project, a large-scale oil drilling proposal in Alaska, and she's organising a protest with compatriots from around the country.

Joshi's pivot underscores the political fallout that Biden is facing over Willow and the tension between honouring his promises on climate change and the nation's energy needs.

The president made fighting global warming a central part of his agenda, and White House officials are quick to defend efforts to p