Democratic Challengers Already Beating Trump on Climate
As Democratic presidential hopefuls gather for tonight's debate in Des Moines, it’s heartening to see all of them solidly united around the urgent need for robust action to address the climate crisis head-on. Each knows we’re paying a price for inaction on climate right now, and they’ve seen how climate chaos threatens our…
Climate Change and the 2020 Presidential Candidates: Where Do They Stand?
(This post was last updated on January 14, 2020.)Climate change is getting unprecedented attention from many of the 2020 presidential candidates. They are responding to the threats posed by a rapidly warming climate, the economic opportunities in switching to clean energy and the increasing concern of American voters: according…
Historic Win for Climate Action in Virginia
Virginians secured a decisive victory for climate action in yesterday’s election, with control of both chambers of the legislature flipping to a climate and clean energy majority. In a state grappling right now with sea-level rise and increasingly extreme weather, not to mention rising energy costs due to overinvestment…
In 2020, Winning is Everything
In a speech today in Pittsburgh, President Trump doubled down on his all-fossil-fuel energy agenda--ignoring the scientific community, the business community, and his own government’s analysis, not to mention ignoring the blindingly obvious signs that the climate crisis has arrived and the American people’s desire for federal action.Trump’s climate…
Fifty Years of Environmental Progress Threatened
This week marks the 50th anniversary of the Woodstock music festival, but there was more to the summer of ’69 than bell bottoms, blues, and butterflies.That same summer in Cleveland, the Cuyahoga River was so badly polluted from industrial waste that it caught on fire. New York and Los Angeles were the…
Ohio Lawmakers Bail Out Coal Plants, Boost Trump
On the campaign trail in 2016, President Trump promised to save the coal industry by eliminating environmental safeguards and cutting limits on greenhouse gas emissions (never mind that industry analysts put most of the blame for coal’s decline on the rise of cheaper energy alternatives). Not surprisingly, Trump’s misguided…
Care About the Climate Crisis? It’s Time to Go All In.
NASA just reported June 2019 was the hottest month in recorded history, and July’s global average temperature will likely be even hotter. All-time heat records are being broken with alarming regularity now both in the U.S. and across the world, and obvious impacts are everywhere - severe floods, fires,…
Climate Deniers Warn GOP Lawmakers: Stay Loyal
“I don’t lose any sleep over it.”Those were the words Interior Secretary David Bernhardt used at a House hearing on May 15 to describe his level of concern about CO2 levels reaching 415 ppm in Earth’s atmosphere, an astounding level of carbon pollution that, if left unchecked, would doom…
GOP’s Climate Deniers Feeling the Heat
At a recent forum in Washington, leading climate science skeptic Myron Ebell of the Competitive Enterprise Institute told attendees that one of the “dangers” of the Green New Deal is that “it’s creating a very large space for a certain class of people, many of them in the Republican…
Election Outcomes Lead to Climate Action Across U.S.
In Washington, D.C., this month, climate change headlines have focused on the Green New Deal and the establishment of the new U.S. House Select Committee on the Climate Crisis. But two months after the election of a new crop of pro-environment governors and state lawmakers, climate progress is beginning…
Election Boosts Chances of Climate, Environmental Action in the States
Gov.-elect Gretchen Whitmer (D-Mich.) (Photo: Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy, University of Michigan)Pro-environment gubernatorial candidates were victorious this year from the Eastern Seaboard to the Golden Gate. With pro-environment lawmakers now heading to numerous governors’ mansions and state legislatures, bold climate action is increasingly possible in these…
Coastal South Carolina Voters Reject Offshore Drilling
The environment was one key reason Republicans lost the midterms, according to an op-ed from Rep. Mark Sanford (R-S.C.), in yesterday’s NY Times:The environment matters to voters. As a party, we have somehow forgotten that conservatism should apply to more than just financial resources. Being conservative should entail being conservative…
Americans Vote for Powerful Check on Trump’s Anti-Environment Agenda
Americans from coast-to-coast have voted for change. They rejected President Trump’s pro-polluter politics, instead handing control of the House of Representatives to a leadership team that embraces common sense environmental safeguards and welcomes the clean energy economy.Lawmakers in the House will be able to hold the Trump administration accountable…
Come Tuesday, Let’s Bring It
Illustration: Jorge Colombo NRDC Action Fund President Rhea Suh (Photo: Zoe Fisher)For nearly two years, we’ve seen President Trump wage the worst White House assault in history on our environment and health. Rolling back commonsense safeguards, slashing enforcement budgets, ignoring sound science and walking away from the progress we’ve…
Elections | |10 Anti-Environment House Members We Won’t Miss in 2019
Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Calif.), climate denier and endangered incumbent.The 2018 election is likely to bring a lot of new faces to Washington, and some anti-environment House incumbents will likely be out of a job. Here are several we certainly wouldn’t miss if they are defeated. These races, some rated…
Are You Ready for November 6th?
With less than a week to go until Election Day, many races are deadlocked and control of Congress is up for grabs. The margins may be small, but the stakes are enormous. This is our biggest chance yet to tell President Trump and his pro-polluter allies in Congress that…
Tallying the Costs of Trump’s Reckless Assault on the Environment and Public Health
President Donald Trump with then-EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt and Secretary of the Interior Ryan ZinkeAmid the rancor and chaos President Trump has brought to Washington, it’s easy to overlook the unconscionable toll of widening hazard and enduring harm he’s imposing on the country, by waging the worst White House…
Elections, Uncategorized | |8 Senate Races We’re Watching This Year
Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.)The NRDC Action Fund’s primary goal in the 2018 election cycle is to defend—and with some luck expand—our Senate Green Firewall. To that end, we’ve endorsed a record 20 environmental champions in Senate races across the country, but a handful of them face a challenging path…
Vote for the Environment and Climate Action in the West
Solar panels collect sunlight at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, Ariz. (U.S. Air Force photo by 1st Lt Sarah Ruckriegle)Voting for a healthy planet for future generations is a responsibility that extends well beyond Congress. While we here at the NRDC Action Fund are focused on greening Congress, this election…
Elections | |New Climate Report Raises Stakes on 2018 Elections
A polar bear drifts on a melted glacier. (Photo: NASA's Oceans Melting Greenland mission)The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) gathered in South Korea this week and delivered a dire warning: unless unprecedented steps are taken by the world’s governments to reduce emissions in the next decade, our planet…
