Senate Dems urge swift action on climate
Duckworth warns of national defense issues; new report calls for major investment in jobs
Sen. Tammy Duckworth is calling for environmental justice in addressing climate change, while warning of “the very real threat to our national security.” (Zoom)
By Ted Cox
U.S. Senate Democrats released a new report on climate change Tuesday, calling for a major investment in clean-energy jobs and and pledging swift action if they’re elected into the majority this fall.
“Everyone knows that climate change is happening now,” said Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York on a media conference call Tuesday. “Those who deny the scientific evidence threaten all of us.
“The report makes clear that immediate, focused action is critical to avoid the worst climate aspects and achieve a clean-energy future,” he added. Drawing parallels with the COVID-19 pandemic as a public health crisis, Schumer said it has “further exposed the importance of trusting scientists when they tell us we’re facing a crisis, and confronting the crisis with the urgency it requires.”
The report, “The Case for Climate Action: Building a Clean Economy for the American People,” calls for the United States to achieve 100 percent global net-zero carbon emissions by 2050, and commits to creating 10 million new clean-energy jobs, in part by increasing federal spending on climate action to at least 2 percent of Gross Domestic Product, with a priority on minority communities that have borne the brunt of pollution and the harshest effects of global warming.
Environmental justice was a key component of the report for Illinois Sen. Tammy Duckworth, who cited the simultaneous “public health and economic crises.” But she also emphasized “the very real threat to our national security,” both in “our own bases that will be under water if we don’t do something about climate change,” as well as the global political instability brought on by “climate migration,” as in the Syrian civil war and the rise of the Boko Haram Islamic militants in Nigeria.
Schumer said the time for action is now, citing the back-to-back tropical storms in the Gulf of Mexico, “while the West is on fire.” He praised how the report calls for investment “at a much greater scale than ever before.”
“We must solve the climate crisis in a way that lifts up working Americans and the communities in which they live,” said Sen. Tina Smith of Minnesota. “This is about opportunity and innovation. It’s about leading.” She praised not only new jobs in the wind and solar industries, but also the gains to be had in energy efficiency — estimated at $1,200 a year for a household — and in public health. “That requires bold action now,” she added.
“For many, many years we have come up short on federal action on climate,” said Sen. Brian Schatz of Hawaii, chairman of the Senate Democrats’ Special Committee on the Climate Crisis, which oversaw the report.
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island bemoaned a “lost decade” of dawdling in Congress, which he blamed on a “massive, covert operation to scuttle meaningful climate legislation” with “disinformation,” funded with “dark money” by the fossil-fuel industry, especially after the controversial U.S. Supreme Court decision on political funding in the Citizens United case 10 years ago.
“It’s really a fossil-fuel-industry operation that is targeting Republicans,” Whitehouse said.
All the Democratic senators pledged swift action if they’re placed in the majority in the upcoming election, with Schatz saying, “Make no mistake, we are ready to roll with climate legislation.”
The report is similar, but not as detailed, as a report House Democrats released at the beginning of July setting forth ambitious goals on climate change. The commitment to spend 2 percent of GDP on the issue, meanwhile, is more concrete than the climate-change plank in the Democratic platform under presidential nominee Joe Biden, which pulled up short of supporting the Green New Deal proposed by U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York.
Schatz, however, said the three separate proposals from representatives, senators, and the Biden campaign “are not the same, but they rhyme,” with “substantial overlap” and the same shared commitment to address the core issue of climate change.