issues2000

Topics in the News: Global Warming


Donald Trump on Energy & Oil : Oct 17, 2024
The real global warming we have to worry about is nuclear

The real global warming that we have to worry about is nuclear. The water's coming up an eighth of an inch, over 300 years, the ocean is going to rise. And nobody knows if that's true or not, but they're worried about the ocean rising an eighth of an inch or a quarter of an inch in 300 years. What I'm worried about is nuclear weapons tomorrow because the power of nuclear weapons, and we're going to end up with this administration, if she gets in, we will end up in a third world war.
Click for Donald Trump on other issues.   Source: Univision Town Hall: Trump interview

JD Vance on Energy & Oil : Oct 2, 2024
We should produce as much energy as possible in the USA

JDV: This idea that carbon emissions drives all the climate change. Well, let's just say that's true, just for the sake of argument, so we're not arguing about weird science. Let's just say that's true. Well, if you believe that, what would you, what would you want to do? The answer is that you'd want to reshore as much American manufacturing as possible and you'd want to produce as much energy as possible in the United States of America because we're the cleanest economy in the entire world.

TW: Senator Vance has said that there's a climate problem in the past, Donald Trump called it a hoax and then joked that these things would make more beachfront property to be able to invest in. So the solution for us is to continue to move forward. Reducing our impact is absolutely critical. But this is not a false choice. You can do that at the same time you're creating the jobs that we're seeing all across the country.

Click for JD Vance on other issues.   Source: 2024 Vice Presidential debate: Tim Walz vs. JD Vance

Tim Walz on Energy & Oil : Oct 2, 2024
Reducing our impact is absolutely critical on climate change

TW: Senator Vance has said that there's a climate problem in the past, Donald Trump called it a hoax and then joked that these things would make more beachfront property to be able to invest in. So the solution for us is to continue to move forward. Reducing our impact is absolutely critical. But this is not a false choice. You can do that at the same time you're creating the jobs that we're seeing all across the country.

JDV: This idea that carbon emissions drives all the climate change. Well, let's just say that's true, just for the sake of argument, so we're not arguing about weird science. Let's just say that's true. Well, if you believe that, what would you, what would you want to do? The answer is that you'd want to reshore as much American manufacturing as possible and you'd want to produce as much energy as possible in the United States of America because we're the cleanest economy in the entire world.

Click for Tim Walz on other issues.   Source: 2024 Vice Presidential debate: Tim Walz vs. JD Vance

Tim Walz on Energy & Oil : Oct 1, 2024
Let's harvest wind and produce more clean energy

Q: What responsibility would your administration have to try and reduce the impact of climate change?

WALZ: Donald Trump called it a hoax, [but Minnesota] farmers know climate change is real. They've seen 500 year droughts, 500 year floods, back to back. But what they're doing is adapting, telling me, "Look, I harvest corn, I harvest soybean, and I harvest wind." We are producing more natural gas and more oil at any time than we ever have. We're also producing more clean energy.

VANCE: The real issue is that if you're spending billions on solar panels that are made in China, you're going to make the economy dirtier. We should be making more of those solar panels here in the United States.

WALZ: We are. In Minnesota.

VANCE: Some of them are, Tim, but a lot of them are being made overseas in China, especially the components that go into those solar panels. So if you really want to make the environment cleaner, you've got to invest in more energy production.

Click for Tim Walz on other issues.   Source: 2024 Vice Presidential debate: Tim Walz vs. JD Vance

JD Vance on Energy & Oil : Oct 1, 2024
Build more clean energy, like nukes and natural gas

Q: Is climate change a hoax?

VANCE: What the President has said is that if Kamala Harris believes that climate change is serious, they would be doing more manufacturing and more energy production in the US, and that's not what they're doing. The real issue is that if you're spending billions of dollars of American taxpayer money on solar panels that are made in China, you're going to make the economy dirtier. We should be making more of those solar panels here in the US. p>WALZ: We are. In Minnesota.

VANCE: Some of them are, Tim, but a lot of them are being made overseas in China, especially the components that go into those solar panels. So if you really want to make the environment cleaner, you've got to invest in more energy production. We built [only one] nuclear facility in the past 40 years. Natural gas--invest more in it. Kamala Harris has done the opposite.

WALZ: We are producing more natural gas and more oil at any time than we ever have. We're also producing more clean energy.

Click for JD Vance on other issues.   Source: 2024 Vice Presidential debate: Tim Walz vs. JD Vance

Kamala Harris on Energy & Oil : Jul 23, 2024
2010s: Sued Big Oil; no climate change disinformation

Climate action has run through Harris's career for decades. As California's attorney general, Harris sued big oil companies like BP and ConocoPhillips, and investigated Exxon Mobil for its role in climate change disinformation. While in the Senate, she sponsored the Green New Deal resolution. And as vice president, Harris made the crucial tie-breaking vote to pass Democrats' historic climate bill.
Click for Kamala Harris on other issues.   Source: CNN coverage of 2024 Presidential hopefuls

JD Vance on Energy & Oil : Jul 16, 2024
Scrap federal tax credits for Electric Vehicles

Vance is a sceptic of renewable energy and climate change, and introduced a bill to scrap federal tax credits for EVs that he said helped "offshore" American workers' jobs to China.
Click for JD Vance on other issues.   Source: South China Morning Post on 2024 Veepstakes

JD Vance on Energy & Oil : Jul 15, 2024
Drive American: Chinese-made EVs don't solve climate crisis

The senator has been dismissive of concerns about climate change. "Even if there was a climate crisis, I don't know how the way to solve it is to buy more Chinese-manufactured electric vehicles," he said in 2022, saying the idea of an environmental crisis was "created" to please Democratic donors.

He has sought to put significant blame on China for greenhouse gas emissions. In a 2023 hearing, Vance dismissed carbon offsets in aviation as "climate reparations": "Why are we effectively penalizing the American aviation while we don't require, or even attempt, to force the Chinese to do the same to their aviation industry?"

Vance last year introduced the "Drive American Act," S. 2962, which would repeal the federal tax credit for electric vehicles and instead offer tax credits for U.S.-made vehicles powered only by gasoline or diesel.

Click for JD Vance on other issues.   Source: Environment & Energy News on 2024 Veepstakes

Bernie Sanders on Principles & Values : Jul 7, 2024
I'd feel awful if America lost our 250 year old democracy

Q: How would you feel if former President Trump wins in November?

SANDERS: Well, I would feel awful, as somebody who has opposed virtually all of Trump's policies. And I would feel awful if the American people lost the democracy which we've had for 250 years. And I would feel awful if we turned our back on the existential threat of climate change.

Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: CBS Face the Nation on 2024 Vermont Senate race

Joe Biden on Energy & Oil : Jun 27, 2024
The only existential threat to humanity is climate change

We're in a situation where the idea that he kind of is claiming to have done something that had the cleanest water, the cleanest water? He had not done a damn thing with the environment. He--out of the Paris Peace Accord--Climate Accord, I immediately joined it, because if we reach for 1.5 degrees Celsius at any one point, well, there is no way back. The only existential threat to humanity is climate change. And he didn't do a damn thing about it. He wants to undo all that I've done.
Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: First Trump-Biden debate, at CNN in Atlanta

Nikki Haley on Energy & Oil : Jan 18, 2024
Climate change is real, but no extreme transitions

Q: In the first debate, you were the only candidate who acknowledged the reality of climate change.

HALEY: You know, it's interesting, because I think that this has been made to be a partisan issue. And it shouldn't be. We all want clean air. We all want clean water. We all want a world for our kids that we know is going to be strong and healthy for them. And so, if you look at that, then it's, how do we get there, right? I do think climate change is real. I think that's acknowledging a fact. We need to acknowledge our facts to know where we go. The problem is, we have seen extremes. So we have seen some people who say, "oh, climate change doesn't exist." And then we see others who say, like Biden, "everybody's got to drive an electric car by 2033." You don't live in extremes. But you also look at, what's the transition? Rather than demonizing producers, partner with the producers, because you will find a lot of the energy producers want to do innovation.

Click for Nikki Haley on other issues.   Source: CNN Town Hall: interviews of 2024 presidential candidates

Ron DeSantis on Energy & Oil : Jan 10, 2024
Kneecapping reliable energy means rolling blackouts

Q: Would you cut carbon emissions, the underlying cause of climate change?

DESANTIS: On day one as President, we take Biden's Green New Deal and we throw it in the trash can. It is bad for this country. We have to have reliable energy. You're going to end up having rolling blackouts if they kneecap reliable energy production in this country. Florida's had a massive decline in emissions--wasn't because of a single mandate. It was because of innovation, because a lot of natural gas has replaced coal. We do have market-based solar, but we cannot walk away from reliable energy. The left wants you to pay more for everything. We need you to pay less for energy. We cannot have these mandates and they'll be gone the day I'm President.

Q: Would you do anything to deal with the underlying cause?

DESANTIS: Innovate, and here's the thing. China is building two coal plants a week. So, why would we be cutting off our nose to spite our face? China is the problem here, and so hold them accountable.

Click for Ron DeSantis on other issues.   Source: CNN 2024 pre-Iowa caucus one-on-one debate

Dean Phillips on Environment : Oct 20, 2023
Restore EPA's ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions

In Congress, Dean has been a vocal advocate for legislation to cut greenhouse gas emissions, mitigate the effects of climate change, and create more resilient communities. Dean is an original cosponsor of the Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act, which would put a price on carbon and return the proceeds to every taxpayer, along with the EPA Regulatory Authority Act of 2022, which would restore the EPA's ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.
Click for Dean Phillips on other issues.   Source: 2022 MN-3 House campaign website PhillipsForCongress.org

Vivek Ramaswamy on Energy & Oil : Aug 23, 2023
Climate change agenda is a hoax

Vivek RAMASWAMY: Let us be honest as Republicans. I'm the only person on the stage who isn't bought and paid for, so I can say this: the climate change agenda is a hoax. And the reality is the anti-carbon agenda is the wet blanket on our economy. And so, the reality is more people are dying of bad climate change policies than they are of actual climate change.

Gov. Nikki HALEY: Is climate change real? Yes, it is. But if you want to really change the environment, then we need to start telling China and India that they have to lower their emissions.

Sen. Tim SCOTT: If we want the environment to be better, the best thing to do is to bring our jobs home from China. If we create 10 million new jobs in my Made in America Plan, we will have a better economy and a better environment. America has cut our carbon footprint in half in the last 25 years. Why do we put ourselves at a disadvantage, devastating our own economy? Let's bring our jobs home.

Click for Vivek Ramaswamy on other issues.   Source: Fox News 2023 Republican primary debate in Milwaukee

Nikki Haley on Energy & Oil : Aug 23, 2023
Ask China and India to lower their emissions

Vivek RAMASWAMY: I can say this: the climate change agenda is a hoax. And the reality is the anti-carbon agenda is the wet blanket on our economy.

Gov. Nikki HALEY: Is climate change real? Yes, it is. But if you want to really change the environment, then we need to start telling China and India that they have to lower their emissions. That's where our problem is. And these green subsidies that Biden has put in, all he's done is help China because he doesn't understand all these electric vehicles that he's done, half of the batteries for electric vehicles are made in China. And so, that's not helping the environment. You're putting money in China's pocket. And Biden did that. We need to acknowledge the truth, which is these subsidies are not working. We also need to take on the international world and say, 'okay, India and China, you've got to stop polluting.' And that's when we'll start to deal with the planet.

Click for Nikki Haley on other issues.   Source: Fox News 2023 Republican primary debate in Milwaukee

Francis Suarez on Energy & Oil : Aug 18, 2023
Climate change is a serious threat; reduce emissions

On Climate Change: He has pursued significant emission reductions in Miami. Mayor Francis X. Suarez of Miami has acknowledged that climate change is a serious threat--one that is already hurting his city, he wrote in 2019 in a New York Times opinion essay with the former United Nations secretary general Ban Ki-moon.
Click for Francis Suarez on other issues.   Source: N.Y. Times on 2023 Presidential hopefuls

Cornel West on Energy & Oil : Jun 16, 2023
Remove oil and gas subsidies, invest in clean energy

Protect the Environment: Clean up pollution in our food, water and air. Tackle climate change and shift to regenerative agriculture. Remove oil and gas subsidies, end drilling on public lands, and invest in clean energy.
Click for Cornel West on other issues.   Source: 2024 Presidential campaign website CornelWest24.com

Marianne Williamson on Energy & Oil : Jun 6, 2023
I will treat global warming problem holistically

As president, I will treat the problem holistically. Global warming harms the weather patterns which harms agriculture and animals which harms people's capacity to live in certain areas which harms the city-to-rural ratio which harms social stability which creates a refugee crisis which all together lead toward untold catastrophe. What is imperative is that we awaken now and take immediate, bold steps to change course.
Click for Marianne Williamson on other issues.   Source: 2024 Presidential campaign website Marianne2024.com

JD Vance on Education : Nov 1, 2022
Climate is changing; solution is nuclear power

Click for JD Vance on other issues.   Source: Guides.vote candidate survey on 2022 Ohio Senate race

Chase Oliver on Energy & Oil : Oct 18, 2022
No carbon caps; no magic legislation

Q: What legislation do you support to address the existential threat of climate change?

CHASE OLIVER: It sounds great to say that we could just magically pass a bill and stop using less carbon and lower the carbon output. But that's just not the way it's going to work. Government involvement stifles innovation. We need to let the marketplace innovate: quit over-regulating green technology. We can fight climate change; that doesn't require massive government action; it doesn't require carbon caps or new government programs. It just requires us to buckle down and American innovation will develop the technologies. In the meantime, government doesn't really have a role in deciding what technology is going to be developing in the next few years.

RAPHAEL WARNOCK: In the church, we call it "Creation Care": we ought to be kind to the earth because it's the only place that we have. I'm glad that we passed the Inflation Reduction Act which represents record investment in a green energy future.

Click for Chase Oliver on other issues.   Source: Atlanta Press Club debate: 2022 Georgia Senate race

Chase Oliver on Technology : Oct 18, 2022
Let innovators reduce carbon; not federal-chosen technology

Q: You don't support government addressing climate change?

A: Government involvement stifles innovation. We need to let the marketplace innovate. It just requires us to buckle down and American innovation will develop the technologies that will power us into the future not using carbon-based fuels. In the meantime, government doesn't really have a role.

Q: Can you name a market-driven innovation that reduced carbon emissions without a government incentive?

A: It's very hard to get that because of the Big Government world we live in. Every major company is reaching out for every subsidy and giveaway they can. But we need to bring market competition back to it, [not] a scramble for who can get the next federal dollars. Elon Musk would've developed the Tesla [electric car] with or without subsidies. Of course he'll take the free money, but that's your money going into Elon Musk's pocket. We don't need to give money to Green billionaires to develop new technology; they'll do that on their own.

Click for Chase Oliver on other issues.   Source: Atlanta Press Club debate: 2022 Georgia Senate race

Larry Elder on Energy & Oil : Jul 22, 2021
Against radicals for whom climate change is a religion

Newsom's surrounded by an army of radicals for whom climate change is a religion-- and growth and development a villain. Because of their fierce opposition to growth, the average home in California costs 150% more than the national average. Because of their radical environmentalism, they oppose building the infrastructure necessary to supply consistent energy and water to a population of 40 million, leaving us with a crumbling system built in the `70's to support a population twice that size.
Click for Larry Elder on other issues.   Source: 2021 California Governor campaign website ElectElder.com

JD Vance on Energy & Oil : Jul 2, 2021
Subsidizing electric vehicle technology helps China, not US

Vance remarked, "What the Biden administration is doing on climate change will effectively force the transfer of manufacturing jobs and capacity to China, because when you subsidize, let's say, electric vehicle technology, what you're really subsidizing is the country that manufactures all that technology, which is China, so you're subsidizing a country that hates us [and] that is building its middle class off the backs of ours."
Click for JD Vance on other issues.   Source: News AKMI on 2022 Ohio Senate race

Joe Biden on Energy & Oil : Apr 22, 2021
Convened "climate world summit"; cut US emissions in half

PROMISE MADE: (JoeBiden.com website): Biden will, in his first 100 days in office, convene a climate world summit to directly engage the leaders of the major carbon-emitting nations of the world to persuade them to join the US in making more ambitious national pledges.

PROMISE KEPT: (NPR, 4/22/21): Emphasizing US commitments on climate change, Pres. Biden kicked off the first international summit during his presidency. He announced that the US would cut its greenhouse gas emissions in half, from 2005 levels, by the end of the decade. Biden was joined by 40 heads of government on Earth Day, focused entirely on lowering greenhouse gas emissions quickly in order to prevent the worst outcomes of a rapidly warming planet.

ANALYSIS: Much of the substantive work on cutting GHGs has yet to be done; only plans & proposals have been announced. However, the 2-day summit, which included Russia & China, fulfills Biden's pledge, within his first 100 days.

Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: NPR on Biden Administration promises

Joe Biden on Energy & Oil : Jan 27, 2021
Appoint Special Envoy for Climate; recognize climate crisis

PROMISE MADE: (Atlanta debate, Nov 20, 2019): BIDEN on climate: "I think it is the existential threat to humanity. I was passing the first climate change bill, while I managed the $90 billion recovery plan, investing more money in infrastructure that related to clean energy than any time ever."

PROMISE KEPT: (Executive Order on Climate Crisis , 1/27/21): It is the policy of my Administration that climate considerations shall be an essential element of U.S. foreign policy and national security. I have created a new Presidentially appointed position, the Special Presidential Envoy for Climate, to elevate the issue of climate change and underscore the commitment my Administration will make toward addressing it.

OnTheIssues ANALYSIS: Biden's order acknowledges primacy of climate change as a matter of national security (which the Trump administration did not). Former Secretary of State John Kerry was appointed as the first "special envoy."

Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: White House press release on Biden Promises

Joe Biden on Energy & Oil : Oct 22, 2020
My plan fights climate change and creates jobs

BIDEN: Climate change is an existential threat to humanity. I was able to get environmental organizations as well as people worried about jobs, to support my climate plan. Because it will create millions of new good paying jobs, we're going to invest in, for example, 50,000 charging stations so that we can own the electric car market of the future. We're going to take 4 million buildings and 2 million homes and retrofit them so they don't leak as much energy, saving hundreds of millions of barrels of oil in the process and creating significant number of jobs.

TRUMP: The [Paris Climate Accord], I took us out because we were going to have to spend trillions of dollars and we were treated very unfairly. I will not sacrifice tens of millions of jobs, thousands and thousands of companies because of the Paris Accord, it was so unfair.

Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: Third 2020 Presidential Debate, moderated by Kristen Welker

Joe Biden on Energy & Oil : Oct 15, 2020
Weatherize 4 million buildings and 2 million homes

Every time we talk about global warming or the environment, the president thinks it's a joke and I think of jobs. What we have to do is focus on the transmission of energy across the country from areas relating to solar and wind.

The reason is that they have not, that has not been mastered yet. I met a lot of people in Silicon Valley. The battery technology is increasing significantly so you're going to be able to have, for example, solar on your home and a battery in your basement. So when the sun doesn't shine for five days, you still have enough energy. So, we're making significant progress.

The other thing we're going to do is provide an awful lot of work. It's estimated to put close to a million people to work by weatherizing four million buildings and two million homes, because we'll save tons and tons of energy or billions of barrels of energy over time. And at the same time provide significant employment and a good union wages, prevailing wages.

Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: Second 2020 Presidential Debate/ABC Town Hall Philadelphia

Mike Pence on Free Trade : Oct 7, 2020
Vote against USMCA was a vote against jobs

American people deserve to know Senator Kamala Harris was one of only 10 members of the Senate to vote against the USMCA (US-Mexico-Canada Agreement). It was a huge win for American auto workers. It was a huge win for American farmers. But Senator you said it didn't go far enough on climate change, you put your radical environmental agenda ahead of American jobs.
Click for Mike Pence on other issues.   Source: 2020 Vice-Presidential Debate in Utah

Donald Trump on Energy & Oil : Sep 29, 2020
Rolled back Clean Power Plan; it increased energy prices

Q: When state officials in the West blamed the raging forest fires on climate change, you said, "I don't think the science knows." You have pulled the US out of the Paris Climate Accord. What do you believe about the science of climate change?

TRUMP: If you look at the Paris Accord, it was a disaster from our standpoint. And people are actually very happy about what's going on because our businesses are doing well.

Q: Do you believe that human greenhouse gas emissions contribute to the global warming of this planet?

TRUMP: I think a lot of things do, but I think to an extent, yes. But I also think we have to do better management of our forest. Every year I get the call, "California's burning!" If you had good forest management, you wouldn't be getting those calls.

Q: If you believe in the science of climate change, why have you rolled back the Obama Clean Power Plan which limited carbon emissions?

TRUMP: Because it was driving energy prices through the sky.

Click for Donald Trump on other issues.   Source: First 2020 Presidential Debate, moderated by Chris Wallace

Mike Pence on Energy & Oil : Sep 22, 2020
Global warming is a myth; treaty is a disaster

[Mike Pence For Congress via Wayback Machine, 2000]: "Global warming is a myth. The global warming treaty is a disaster. There, I said it. Just like the 'new ice age' scare of the 1970's, the environmental movement has found a new chant for their latest 'chicken little' attempt to raise taxes & grow centralized governmental power. The chant is 'the sky is warming! the sky is warming!'"

[Star Press, 1/7/10]: "On nuclear power: 'I think we ought to build 100 new nuclear plants in the next 20 years.'"

Click for Mike Pence on other issues.   Source: FactCheck on 2020 Trump Research Book

Mike Pence on Energy & Oil : Sep 22, 2020
Cap and trade would raise home utility rates more than $3100

[NUVO, 9/27/12]: "I'm concerned about policies like a national energy tax that would work such a hardship on Hoosier utility ratepayers. I think the issue of climate change -- and the cause of any climate change that's occurring -- is a subject of scientific debate. And I think the science should always drive that debate, but I strongly oppose efforts to enact cap and trade legislation at the national level."

[Federal News Service, 4/20/09]: "Now, you've got the EPA essentially saying that carbon dioxide represents a threat to the environment and that's going to set into motion, Democrats on Capitol Hill and this administration, bringing forward a cap and trade bill, which literally could see the utility rates of every American household go up by more than $3,100 per year."

Click for Mike Pence on other issues.   Source: FactCheck on 2020 Trump Research Book

Joe Biden on Education : Sep 17, 2020
$100B for school ventilation; part of $1T for infrastructure

Q: How you will make sure our communities are protected from the results of global warming?

BIDEN: I have laid out in detail what I'll do, and I'm going to see to it that I said we get to a net zero power grid by 2035. No president can [instantly] turn around and change what we're doing. We're going to get to net zero emissions by the year 2050 before. In the meantime, there's so much we can do and still make it better for people. We're going to invest in close to a trillion dollars over time in the near time for infrastructure. We're going to build green infrastructure. For example, I propose that we spend $100 billion on making sure our schools have the right the right ventilation, [to ensure that] your schools, in fact, are safe. Making sure schools are in a position where they are not generating the use of more energy. We're going to build back buildings that vastly cut down on the amount of fossil fuels that we use.

Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: CNN Town Hall 2020 drive-in with Anderson Cooper

Joe Biden on Energy & Oil : Sep 17, 2020
When I hear global warming, I think jobs

When Trump thinks about global warming, he thinks "hoax." When I hear global warming, I think "jobs." I'm going to make sure that we have 500,000 charging stations in our highways so we can all the electric car market, creating a million jobs and we can lead the world. And in Detroit, we can lead the world and making sure we move to electric vehicles.

Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: CNN Town Hall 2020 drive-in with Anderson Cooper

Joe Biden on Principles & Values : Aug 21, 2020
I believe America ready to face difficult crises

[Excerpts of DNC speech]: "History has delivered us to one of the most difficult moments America has ever faced," he said. "The worst pandemic in over 100 years. The worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. The most compelling call for racial justice since the 60s. And the undeniable realities and accelerating threats of climate change. So, the question for us is simple: are we ready? I believe we are."
Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: D.Strauss/The Guardian on 2020 Dem. National Convention

Joe Biden on Energy & Oil : Aug 20, 2020
Climate change not only a crisis but an enormous opportunity

We can, and we will, deal with climate change. It's not only a crisis, it's an enormous opportunity. An opportunity for America to lead the world in clean energy and create millions of new good-paying jobs in the process.
Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: Acceptance speech at 2020 Democratic National Convention

Joe Biden on Principles & Values : Aug 20, 2020
Four historic crises, all at the same time: a perfect storm

History has delivered us to one of the most difficult moments America has ever faced. Four historic crises. All at the same time. A perfect storm. The worst pandemic in over 100 years. The worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. The most compelling call for racial justice since the '60s. And the undeniable realities and accelerating threats of climate change. So, the question for us is simple: Are we ready? I believe we are. We must be.

I will be a Democratic candidate, I will be an American president. I will work as hard for those who didn't support me as I will for those who did. That's the job of a president. To represent all of us, not just our base or our party. This is not a partisan moment. This must be an American moment. America isn't just a collection of clashing interests of red states or blue states. We're so much bigger than that. We're so much better than that.

Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: Acceptance speech at 2020 Democratic National Convention

Donald Trump on Corporations : Jun 9, 2020
OpEd: replaced scientific fact with profit-driven opinion

Convincing Americans not to trust the government was the first step. For decades, Congressional Republicans have executed the second step by stripping crucial bureaucracies of funding. The third step has been replacing scientific fact with profit- driven opinion. [For example, with] climate change deniers, modern conservative ideology has rejected research as a necessary ingredient for decision making.

The weakening of our public administration infrastructure has reached its pinnacle in the Trump administration. Trump and his cabinet have consistently derided the very institutions they lead. Americans have become inured to the churn of cabinet officials and staff officials and staff departures. Trump's steady stream lies has half of the country turning a deaf ear and the other half ingesting false information. Trump's actions have built on the GOP's intentional destruction of institutions, and has left America weakened in a time of international crisis.

Click for Donald Trump on other issues.   Source: Our Time Is Now, by Stacey Abrams, p.256-7

Dean Phillips on Energy & Oil : Apr 28, 2020
Expand incentives for clean-energy production

Climate change is a global problem that requires global solutions, and Dean believes the U.S. should be a leader in global negotiations on climate change--as it was until President Trump was elected. Dean will actively work to provide a check on this Administration's reckless and shortsighted attacks on the environment, and restore America's role as an international leader in curbing climate change.

Dean will work to incentivize renewable energy from wind and solar, and for infrastructure investments to develop a clean and reliable electrical grid. He supports extending the 30% federal tax credit for solar and other renewable energy, rather than letting the credits decrease after 2019 and disappear altogether after 2021, as they will under current law.

Click for Dean Phillips on other issues.   Source: 2018 MN-3 House campaign website PhillipsForCongress.org

Joe Biden on Energy & Oil : Mar 15, 2020
I wrote the first climate change bill in the Congress

No more subsidies for fossil fuel industry. No more drilling on federal lands. No more drilling, including offshore. No ability for the oil industry to continue to drill, period. We are able to move rapidly to change the dynamic, in terms of what we can do to set in motion. We could get everything exactly right, we're 15% of the problem. 85% of the problem is over there. We need someone who can deal internationally.

My plan takes on the fossil fuel industry and it unites the world. I'm saying we bring them together, make them live up to the commitments. If they don't live up to the commitments, they pay a financial price for it. They pay an economic price for it. Because we can do everything, my state is three feet above sea level. I don't need a lecture on what's going to happen about rising seas. I wrote the first climate change bill that was in the Congress, which PolitiFact said was a game changer.

Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: 11th Democratic primary debate (Biden-Sanders one-on-one)

Joe Biden on Environment : Mar 15, 2020
World should give $20B to Brazil to stop burning Amazon

The first thing that President Obama and I were summoned to the Defense Department for was [to hear their assessment that] the single greatest threat to our national security is climate change. Because as populations have to move because they can no longer live where they are, because their islands are sinking--It causes war, it causes great migrations. They said that's the single biggest problem.

In addition, I would immediately rejoin the Paris climate accord, which I helped put together. I would call on the 100 nations, the 100 major polluters, in the first 100 days, to up the ante and make it clear that in fact if they didn't, there'd be a price to pay.

And lastly, I would be right now organizing the hemisphere and the world, to provide $20 billion for the Amazon, for Brazil no longer to burn the Amazon, so they could have forests. They could have farming [but instead of burning, say], "This is what we're going to do." The region is burning out.

Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: 11th Democratic primary debate (Biden-Sanders one-on-one)

Bernie Sanders on Health Care : Feb 25, 2020
International cooperation on coronavirus, and full funding

In the White House today, we have a self-described "great genius"--self-described--and this "great genius" has told us that this Coronavirus is going to end in two months. April is the magical day that this great scientist we have in the White House has determined--I wish I was kidding; that is what he said.

What do we have to do? Whether or not the issue is climate change, which is clearly a global crisis requiring international cooperation, or infectious diseases like Coronavirus, requiring international cooperation, we have to work and expand the World Health Organization.

Obviously, we have to make sure the CDC, the NIH, our infectious departments, are fully funded. This is a global problem. We've got to work with countries all the over the world to solve it.

Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: 10th Democratic Primary debate on eve of S.C. primary

Joe Biden on Energy & Oil : Feb 19, 2020
Invest in batteries to transmit solar power

The existential threat humanity faces is global warming. I went out to a facility where you have one of the largest solar panel arrays in the world. And when the fourth stage is completed, it will be able to take care of 60,000 homes for every single bit of their needs.

And what I would do is, number one, work on providing the $47 billion we have for tech and for making sure we find answers--to find a way to transmit that wind and solar energy across the network in the United States. Invest in battery technology.

I would immediately reinstate all of the elimination of what Trump has eliminated in terms of the EPA. I would secondly make sure that we had 500,000 new charging stations in every new highway we built or repaired. I would make sure that we once again made sure that we got the mileage standards back up which would have saved over 12 billion barrels of oil. And I would invest in rail. Rail can take millions of cars off the road if we have high-speed rail.

Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: MSNBC's 9th Democrat primary debate, in Las Vegas

Bernie Sanders on Homeland Security : Feb 8, 2020
FactCheck: $1.8 trillion on all military, not just weapons

In discussing his hope to galvanize international support to collectively combat climate change, Sanders inaccurately characterized a statistic on global military spending. "Here is my dream--maybe it's a radical dream," Sanders said. "But maybe, just maybe, given the crisis of climate change, the world can understand that instead of spending $1.8 trillion a year, collectively, on weapons of destruction, designed to kill each other, maybe we pool our resources and fight our common enemy, which is climate change."

That $1.8 trillion represents spending on more than just weapons. The figure is the 2018 total world military expenditure, as calculated by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. "Military expenditure" refers to all government spending on current military forces and activities, including salaries and benefits, operational expenses, arms and equipment purchases, military construction, research and development, and central administration, command and support.

Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: FactCheck.org on 8th Democrat 2020 primary debate

Bernie Sanders on Free Trade : Feb 7, 2020
Not one word in USMCA that deals with climate change

What the environmental groups are saying, we're simply exporting fossil fuel emissions to Mexico. There is not one word in that trade agreement that deals with climate change and I don't know how in 2020 you can do that. Second of all, there is, in terms of outsourcing of jobs, a major crisis in this country. Nobody believes that under this Trump trade agreement that they will not be continued and significant outsourcing of jobs into low wage Mexico.
Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: 8th Democrat 2020 primary debate, St. Anselm College in NH

Bernie Sanders on Homeland Security : Feb 7, 2020
We spend $1.8T on collective military; spend it on climate

Here is my dream, maybe it's a radical dream, but maybe just may be given the crisis of climate change, the world can understand that instead of spending $1.8 trillion dollars a year collectively on weapons of destruction designed to kill each other, maybe we pool our resources and fight our common enemy, which is climate change.
Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: 8th Democrat 2020 primary debate, St. Anselm College in NH

Bernie Sanders on War & Peace : Feb 7, 2020
I listened about Iraq; they were lying thru their teeth

I also heard the arguments in terms of the war in Iraq from Bush, from Cheney, from John Bolton. If you hear what I said, it's on YouTube, my fears about all the destabilization that would take place by the US invading Iraq. That is what happened. Trump wants to build a wall around America. The problem is if we are going to deal with issues like climate change, not only do we in America have to take on the greed of the fossil fuel industry, we have to lead the entire world. It's a global issue.
Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: 8th Democrat 2020 primary debate, St. Anselm College in NH

Joe Biden on Energy & Oil : Jan 14, 2020
I introduced the first climate change bill in 1986

Back in 1986, I introduced the first climate change bill--and check PolitiFact.com: they said it was a game-changer. I've been fighting this for a long time. I headed up the Recovery Act, which put more money into moving away from fossil fuels to solar and wind energy than ever has occurred in the history of America.

Look, what we have to do is we have to act right away. And immediately, if I'm elected president, I'll reinstate all the mileage standards that existed in our administration which were taken down. That's 12 billion barrels of gasoline to be saved immediately.

And with regard to those folks who in fact are going to be victimized by what's already happened, we should be investing in infrastructure that raises roads, makes sure that every new highway built is a green highway, having 550,000 charging stations.

We can create millions of good-paying jobs. We're the only country in the world that's ever taken great crises and turned them into great opportunity.

Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: 7th Democrat primary debate, on eve of Iowa caucus

Joe Biden on Energy & Oil : Nov 20, 2019
Prioritized climate for decades, as existential threat

Tom STEYER: I'm the only person on this stage who will say that climate is the number-one priority. I would declare a state of emergency on day one. I've spent a decade fighting and beating oil companies, stopping pipelines, stopping fossil fuel plants, ensuring clean energy across the country. I would make this the number-one priority of my foreign policy.

Joe BIDEN: I think it is the existential threat to humanity. While I was passing the first climate change bill, while I managed the $90 billion recovery plan, investing more money in infrastructure that related to clean energy than any time we've ever done it, my friend was introducing more coal mines and produced more coal around the world, according to the press, than all of Great Britain produces.

Bernie SANDERS: If we don't get our act together within the next eight or nine years, we're talking about major cities going underwater, increased drought, increased extreme weather disturbances.

Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: November Democratic primary debate in Atlanta

Corey Stapleton on Energy & Oil : Sep 24, 2019
Free-market capitalism is key to addressing global warming

Stapleton says the current trade wars are emblematic of a global shift toward protectionism, and adds that he thinks free-market capitalism is key to addressing global issues like the warming climate and poverty.
Click for Corey Stapleton on other issues.   Source: Montana Free Press on 2023 Presidential hopefuls

Mike Pence on Technology : Sep 14, 2019
Questions scientific community on ozone & global warming

[In his 2000 Congressional campaign debate], Pence tried to change topics, saying, "My Democratic opponent tries to put me in the extreme by saying global warming is a myth. The reality is there is a growing number in the scientific community who are questioning, just questioning, which scientists are supposed to do, some of the theories of global warming, the erosion of the ozone layer." Pence then made a clever move, saying that his Democratic opponent must surely support the treaty to combat global warming supported by the Democratic candidate, Al Gore. [Democratic opponent] Bob Rock said he'd have to study more before making that decision. Then Pence cut him off, "Well if I believe that global warming is real, then I would support the treaty."
Click for Mike Pence on other issues.   Source: Piety & Power, by Tom LoBianco, p.117

Joe Biden on Government Reform : Sep 12, 2019
Immediate focus on health care, education, climate change

I refuse to postpone one more minute spending billions of dollars on curing cancer, Alzheimer's, and other diseases which, if we invest in them, we can find cures. I refuse to postpone giving single child in America, no matter their zip code, pre-K all the way through high school and beyond. I refuse to postpone any longer taking on climate change.
Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: September Democratic Primary debate in Houston

Bernie Sanders on Government Reform : Sep 12, 2019
Power to the people, not the billionaires

We have to recognize that this country is moving into an oligarchic society where a handful of billionaires control the economic and political life. As president, I am prepared to take them on. Yes, we will raise the minimum wage to a living wage. Yes, we will finally make sure that every American has health care as a human right, not a privilege. And, yes, we will address the catastrophic crisis of climate change and transform our energy system away from fossil fuel.
Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: September Democratic Primary debate in Houston

Kamala Harris on Energy & Oil : Sep 4, 2019
Shouldn't sell/lease public land for drilling

Q: How do you plan to support already at-risk and marginalized people who are experiencing the impact of climate change now?

HARRIS: Ultimately, it's about empowering communities that are often ignored. All of those communities have been disproportionately impacted by the change that we are seeing in our climate, not to mention the kind of behaviors by the fossil fuel industry that have been about pollution, about dumping and all that. It should be our responsibility to make sure that we leverage the incredible power we have in a way that is about empowering the communities that have been long overlooked and ignored.

Q: What about public lands?

HARRIS: We should not be selling or leasing public land for the purposes of drilling. One of my greatest priorities on this subject will be about preservation of public lands.

Click for Kamala Harris on other issues.   Source: Climate Crisis Town Hall (CNN 2019 Democratic primary)

Joe Biden on Energy & Oil : Sep 4, 2019
Start on climate change now; do more as things change

Q: Your climate plan calls for net zero emissions by 2050. Others are talking 10 years. Your climate change plan talks about spending $1.7 trillion. Other candidates are talking about spending $16 trillion. Is your plan aggressive enough?

BIDEN: Yes, I think it is aggressive enough. It has gotten good reviews from most of the environmental community. But science and technology are going to change. We learn more, we can do more. We have to start and do things we know can be done immedia keep moving. There's a lot we have to do by 2030 just to set in place a set of institutional structures that mean you can't turn it around, like this president has done. It is an existential threat. There is no doubt about that. We make up 15% of the problem. The rest of the world makes up 80%, 85% of the problem. We still have to get the rest of the world to come along. I have great experience in leading coalitions both at home and internationally. I think I can do that better than an

Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: Climate Crisis Town Hall (CNN 2019 Democratic primary)

Joe Biden on Energy & Oil : Sep 4, 2019
Undo what Trump has done, from CAFE to other standards

Q: What specific steps would you take in your first year that would help mitigate the impact of climate change?

BIDEN: First of all, we have to turn back all of the changes that the president has made, from CAFE standards to moving in a direction that we deal with providing people who get displaced opportunities to have jobs. Whole range of things. I would see to a standard that we provide efficiency for appliances, that saves billions of gallons of gasoline--$500 billion in savings and two billion metric tons of CO2 going into the air. We should do it across the board. I propose we have 500,000 charging stations in the new green economy. We should own the electric vehicle market. I think we should raise the CAFE standards, bring them back to where they were. It goes on from there. But the bottom line is, to set in place standards that cannot be walked away from when the next president does what Trump tries to do.

Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: CNN Climate Crisis Town Hall marathon (10 Democrats)

Bernie Sanders on Health Care : Sep 4, 2019
We lose 30,000 people a year due to not going to the doctor

Q: Of all of your ambitious plans--free public college, Medicare-for-all, eliminating student debt, Green New Deal--

SANDERS: Keep going. You're doing great!

Q: What is the priority on climate change compared to all these others, if you have to choose?

SANDERS: Well, I have the radical idea that a sane Congress can walk and chew bubble gum at the same time. And, you know, there are so many crises that are out there today. I worry very much that we lose 30,000 people a year because they don't have the money to go to a doctor when they should and that 87 million people are uninsured or underinsured. And I will implement as president a Medicare-for-all single-payer program. So to my mind, it's not prioritizing this over that. It is finally having a government which represents working families and the middle class rather than wealthy campaign contributors. And when you do that, then things fall in place.

Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: CNN Climate Crisis Town Hall marathon (10 Democrats)

Bernie Sanders on Homeland Security : Sep 4, 2019
Cut military spending to pay for fixing climate change

Q: Your climate plan is specific about how you will spend $16 trillion [over 15 years]. Can you be equally specific about where that money is coming from?

SANDERS: We have a moral responsibility to act boldly, and to do that, yes, it is going to be expensive. This is how we get the money.

  1. Insanely, right now we are giving the fossil fuel industry approximately $400 billion every single year in subsidies and tax breaks. Obviously, we end that.
  2. We believe that the federal government is the best way to move aggressively to produce sustainable energy, like wind and solar. We will expand public power concepts like the TVA.
  3. We are not going to have to spend money on the military defending oil interests around the world. We can cut military spending there, as well.
  4. Our program will create up to 20 million good- paying jobs over the period of the 15 years. And when we do that, you're going to have a lot of taxpayers out there who will be paying more in taxes
Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: CNN Climate Crisis Town Hall marathon (10 Democrats)

Joe Biden on Jobs : Sep 4, 2019
Working on climate change can create 10 million jobs

This is an enormous opportunity. We can create over 10 million jobs that are making $25 bucks an hour. If we are able to move in a direction that we have 500,000 charging stations for electric vehicles, what does that do? Well, that gives us a corner on the electric vehicle market. That will create thousands of good jobs in the automobile industry. We will own the market.
Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: Climate Crisis Town Hall (CNN 2019 Democratic primary)

Bernie Sanders on Jobs : Sep 4, 2019
Help transition for miners: income for 5 years, & education

Q: How would you help workers of the fossil fuel industry transition to other respectable fields of work in a future green economy?

SANDERS: The coal miners in this country, the men and women who work on the oil rigs, they are not my enemy. My enemy is climate change. We have built into our $16 trillion plan, tens of billions of dollars for a just transition. If some worker loses their job because we're moving away from fossil fuel, we're going to guarantee them an income for five years, the education they need, because those workers are not our enemies. They should not be punished because we're trying to save the planet.

Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: Climate Crisis Town Hall (CNN 2019 Democratic primary)

Kamala Harris on Technology : Sep 4, 2019
All electric cars and school buses by 2045

Q: At a rally in Atlanta earlier this year you said, "Without much change to your lifestyle we could confront climate change." Is that realistic that as regular Americans we don't have to make many sacrifices?

HARRIS: I'm not saying there won't be any change but part of my perspective on this is I've actually seen what's possible when leaders lead. I've seen how in California we put in place some of the toughest, smartest laws and required changes in behavior and we saw outcomes. And I don't think anybody who has lived in California over all those years would say there was any drastic change to their lifestyle. Yes, they may say "well, I'm now driving a car that I can't really hear sometimes." You know, that Prius, right?

Q: S

Click for Kamala Harris on other issues.   Source: CNN Climate Crisis Town Hall marathon (10 Democrats)

Tulsi Gabbard on Energy & Oil : Jul 31, 2019
Off Fossil Fuel Act: plan to deal with climate change

Long before there was ever a Green New Deal, I introduced the most ambitious climate change legislation ever in Congress called the Off Fossil Fuels Act. That actually laid out an actionable plan to take us from where we are today to transition off of fossil fuels and invest in green renewable energy, invest in workforce training, invest in the kinds of infrastructure that we need to deal with the problems and the challenges that climate is posing to us today.
Click for Tulsi Gabbard on other issues.   Source: July Democratic Primary debate (second night in Detroit)

Bernie Sanders on Jobs : Jul 30, 2019
Ain't nobody in Congress more pro-worker than I am

Gov. Steve Bullock: All of us agree that we have address climate change. The Republicans won't even acknowledge that climate change is real, and that's because of the corrupting influence and money. As we transition to this clean energy economy, there are folks that have spent their whole life powering our country, and far too often, Democrats sound like they're part of the problem.

SANDERS: Look, Steve, there ain't nobody in the Congress who's more strongly pro-worker than I am. So when I talk about taking on the fossil fuel industry, what I am also talking about is a just transition. We can create what the Green New Deal is about. We can create millions of good-paying jobs. We can rebuild communities in rural America that have been devastated. So we are not anti-worker. We are going to provide and make sure that those workers have a transition, new jobs, healthcare and education.

Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: July Democratic Primary debate (first night in Detroit)

Kamala Harris on Environment : Jul 17, 2019
Develop new nuclear technologies

Kamala Harris on Nuclear Power: Support developing new nuclear technologies as part of an effort to fight climate change.

TWO CANDIDATES HAVE SIMILAR VIEWS: Joseph Biden, Jr.; Jay Inslee.

Utilities and scientists are developing nuclear power reactors that are much smaller than the massive facilities that have been used in past decades. The new reactors, called Small Modular Reactors that the Energy Department's national labs are helping to develop, would produce perhaps 50 to 100 megawatts.

Click for Kamala Harris on other issues.   Source: Politico "2020Dems on the Issues"

Joe Biden on Environment : Jul 17, 2019
Develop new nuclear technologies

Biden on Nuclear Power: Support developing new nuclear technologies as part of an effort to fight climate change.

TWO CANDIDATES HAVE SIMILAR VIEWS: Kamala Harris; Jay Inslee.

Utilities and scientists are developing nuclear power reactors that are much smaller than the massive facilities that have been used in past decades. The new reactors, called Small Modular Reactors that the Energy Department's national labs are helping to develop, would produce perhaps 50 to 100 megawatts.

Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: Politico "2020Dems on the Issues"

Kamala Harris on Energy & Oil : Jun 27, 2019
Climate crisis represents existential threat to our species

I don't call it climate change. It's a climate crisis. It represents an existential threat to us as a species. And the fact that we have a president who has embraced science fiction over science fact will be to our collective peril. We must confront what is immediate and before us right now. That is why I support a Green New Deal. It is why I will re-enter us in the Paris Agreement, because we have to take these issues seriously.
Click for Kamala Harris on other issues.   Source: June Democratic Primary debate (second night in Miami)

Bernie Sanders on Energy & Oil : Jun 27, 2019
Scientists say "12 years before damage is irreversible"

Scientists tell us we have 12 years before there is irreparable damage to this planet. This is a global issue. What the president should do is not deny the reality of climate change but tell the rest of the world that, instead of spending a trillion and a half dollars on weapons of destruction, let us get together for the common enemy, and transform the world's energy system away from fossil fuel to energy efficiency and sustainable energy. The future of the planet rests on us doing that.
Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: June Democratic Primary debate (second night in Miami)

Mike Pence on Energy & Oil : Jun 23, 2019
Fighting climate change should not increase utility rates

Q: Do you believe think human-induced climate emergency is a threat to the United States?

Pence: We will always follow the science on that in this administration. What we won't do -- and the Clean Power Plan was all about that -- was hamstring energy in this country, raising the cost of utility rates for working families across this country while other nations like China and India absolutely do nothing or make illusory promises decades down the road to deal with it.

Click for Mike Pence on other issues.   Source: CNN State of the Union 2019 interview

Howie Hawkins on Environment : May 28, 2019
Convert corporate agribusiness to organic agriculture

The Green New Deal will convert corporate agribusiness to organic agriculture. Conversion to regenerative agriculture is needed to combat climate change by drawing atmospheric carbon into the biosphere and to end the pesticides and habitat destruction of industrial farming that is a major cause of the mass extinctions of species now underway. We want to replace monocultural, chemicalized, and industrialized corporate agribusiness with family and cooperative organic farms.
Click for Howie Hawkins on other issues.   Source: Declaration of Candidacy for the Green Party Nomination

Howie Hawkins on Homeland Security : May 28, 2019
Cut military budget 75%; withdraw from 800 foreign bases

We want to cut the military budget by 75%. The biggest security threat we face is climate change. A $250 billion military budget will still be the world's largest. It is far less costly in terms of personnel and weapons to defend a home territory than to invade and occupy foreign territory. We are demanding that the US adopt a non-offensive defense posture, withdraw from over 800 foreign military bases, and be the world's humanitarian superpower instead of its global military empire.
Click for Howie Hawkins on other issues.   Source: Declaration of Candidacy for the Green Party Nomination

Kamala Harris on Free Trade : May 12, 2019
Trade agreements should address climate change

I would not have voted for NAFTA, and because I believe that we can do a better job to protect American workers. I also believe that we need to do a better job in terms of thinking about the priorities that should be more apparent now perhaps than they were, which are issues like the climate crisis, and what we need to do to build into these trade agreements.
Click for Kamala Harris on other issues.   Source: CNN SOTU 2019 interview of presidential hopefuls

Kamala Harris on Energy & Oil : Apr 22, 2019
Green New Deal sets agenda for dealing with climate change

The climate crisis is representing an existential threat to who we are as human beings. I support the Green New Deal because it puts timelines in effect. I think, for example, that we need to have -- really diversify public policy on water, with an equal emphasis on recycling, on conservation, on capture of water, storage of water, desalination. We need to invest in electric cars. We need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. All of that is in the Green New Deal.
Click for Kamala Harris on other issues.   Source: CNN Town Hall 2020: 5 candidates back-to-back

Bernie Sanders on Energy & Oil : Apr 18, 2019
Keep US in Paris Climate Agreement & increase targets

Q: As president, would you keep the U.S. in the Paris Agreement and commit to more ambitious targets in 2020?

A: Sanders's campaign confirmed that he would keep the United States in the Paris Agreement and increase emission reduction targets, but did not provide an on-the-record quote.

Q: Would you restore Obama-era climate change regulations that the Trump administration has reversed, like the Clean Power Plan, methane limits and vehicle emissions standards?

A: Sanders's campaign said he would restore Obama-era regulations.

Q: Do you support new regulations to cut greenhouse gas emissions beyond what was in place under President Obama?

A: Sanders's campaign said he would go beyond Obama-era regulations, but did not elaborate or provide an on-the-record quote.

Q: Do you support a national renewable energy standard? If so, what would it be? If not, why not?

A: Sanders's campaign reiterated his support for the Green New Deal, which calls for 100 percent renewable energy.

Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: 2019 "Meet the Candidates" (NY Times.com)

Tulsi Gabbard on Energy & Oil : Apr 18, 2019
2017: Short-sighted to withdraw from Paris Climate Accord

Q: As president, would you keep the US in the Paris Agreement?

Ms. Gabbard's campaign responded with a 2017 statement: "President Trump's decision to withdraw from the Paris Agreement, making us just one of three countries in the world not to participate, is short-sighted and irresponsible. Without global action to drastically curb carbon pollution, climate change threatens the safety and security of the planet, especially in places like Hawaii where we are already experiencing its devastating effects. The US should be leading by example, leveraging innovation through science and technology, investing in clean energy, creating renewable energy jobs that cannot be outsourced, growing the economy, enhancing U.S. energy independence, and lowering energy costs for families and businesses, while reducing carbon emissions. We must continue to persevere and do our part to support efforts in the private sector and at all levels of government to combat climate change."

Click for Tulsi Gabbard on other issues.   Source: 2019 "Meet the Candidates" (NY Times.com)

Kamala Harris on Energy & Oil : Apr 18, 2019
Restore Clean Power Plan and Clean Car Standards

Q: As president, would you keep the U.S. in the Paris Agreement and commit to more ambitious targets in 2020?

A: Yes, she wants to return the U.S. to the Paris deal.

Q: Would you restore Obama-era climate change regulations that the Trump administration has reversed, like the Clean Power Plan?

A: Harris's campaign said she wanted to "restore the Clean Power Plan and fully implement the Clean Car Standards."

Q: Do you support a national renewable energy standard?

A: She is for a national goal for renewable energy.

Q: Do you support increasing federal funding for clean-energy research?

A: Harris's campaign said that as president, she would "invest in clean energy research and infrastructure."

Click for Kamala Harris on other issues.   Source: 2019 "Meet the Candidates" (NY Times.com)

Tulsi Gabbard on Free Trade : Apr 18, 2019
Ban oil & gas exports; end fossil-fuel subsidies

Q: Do you support new regulations to cut greenhouse gas emissions beyond what was in place under President Obama?

Gabbard: I have long been an advocate of aggressive climate change legislation to curb greenhouse gas emissions, including:

Click for Tulsi Gabbard on other issues.   Source: 2019 "Meet the Candidates" (NY Times.com)

Marianne Williamson on Energy & Oil : Apr 14, 2019
Climate change biggest crisis of our time

On climate change: It is the greatest moral challenge of our age. We need carbon sequestration. We need the reforestation. We need to develop sustainable energy systems. We need new modes of electric transportation, et cetera. Enough with these incremental changes here and these incremental changes there. The climate is a crisis. We have 12 years to deal with it.
Click for Marianne Williamson on other issues.   Source: CNN Town Hall 2020 Democratic primary

Bernie Sanders on Corporations : Apr 12, 2019
Break up big agriculture corporations

Sanders rolled out a proposal to help revitalize rural farming communities and break up big agriculture corporations. The comprehensive plan would enact "Roosevelt style trust-busting laws," address climate change and propose job training and education for farmers.
Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: Axios.com "What you need to know about 2020"

Bernie Sanders on Energy & Oil : Apr 12, 2019
Co-sponsor of Green New Deal

Green New Deal: Sanders is a co-sponsor of the bill and has spoken consistently about the severity of climate change.
Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: Axios.com "What you need to know about 2020"

Marianne Williamson on Energy & Oil : Apr 8, 2019
Supports Green New Deal and green jobs program

Under a Williamson administration, we will take a full systems approach. A Green New Deal would provide an overall strategy for how clean energy, sustainable infrastructure and transportation, and a national green jobs program can revitalize our economy and utilize our innovative and human capacity to benefit all our people. While it doesn't cover the whole range of measures we must undertake to reverse global warming, it is an important step, therefore I support it.
Click for Marianne Williamson on other issues.   Source: 2020 presidential campaign website Marianne2020.com

Tulsi Gabbard on Energy & Oil : Mar 10, 2019
Address climate change; US must lead worldwide effort

This really needs to happen at the national level, and it needs to happen at the global level. Even if we made the kind of change we need to see, the radical change we want to see here in this country, to completely get off of fossil fuels and invest in green economy and sustainable infrastructure and make the kinds of changes we want to see, that still will not have enough of an impact. This is why it's so important that we have relationships with these other countries that are based on cooperation, so that we can talk about how we can protect our environment, how we can protect our future. If we can't have those conversations, then there's no possibility for progress there.
Click for Tulsi Gabbard on other issues.   Source: CNN Town Hall on 2020 Democratic presidential primary

Howie Hawkins on Energy & Oil : Feb 25, 2019
Claims to be the "original Green New Dealer"

Howie Hawkins accused the congresswoman of appropriating the Green New Deal--a bold new plan introduced by Ocasio-Cortez that calls for the U.S. to run on 100% renewable energy by 2030. "A lot of people think [Ocasio-Cortez] thought it up," Hawkins told The New Republic. "But I'm the original Green New Dealer." Hawkins proposed to fight climate change "with the same urgency ... that our country demonstrated in converting to war production" during World War II.
Click for Howie Hawkins on other issues.   Source: The Week/The New Republic on 2020 presidential hopefuls

Howie Hawkins on Energy & Oil : Feb 22, 2019
I'm the original Green New Dealer, since 2010

Green Party candidate Howie Hawkins wants to set the record straight. "A lot of people think Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez thought up the Green New Deal," he told me. "But I'm the original Green New Dealer."

Hawkins says he was the first American political candidate to run on the promise of a Green New Deal. During his run for NY governor in 2010, he proposed a plan to fight climate change "with the same urgency, speed, and commitment of resources that our country demonstrated in converting to war production for the mobilization for World War II." To reduce carbon emissions to net zero over ten years, Hawkins's plan would "devote resources to and create jobs in renewable energy, public transit and organic agriculture." And those resources would come from progressive tax reform.

Hawkins thinks the Green New Deal is being unfairly co-opted. But he's happy that it's become mainstream, because "it's our opportunity to explain how the Democratic establishment chopped away the pieces," he said.

Click for Howie Hawkins on other issues.   Source: The New Republic magazine on 2020 Presidential hopefuls

Joe Biden on Foreign Policy : Feb 19, 2019
US can't do it alone: stay engaged in the world

Biden discussed how it's important to reassert the U.S.' commitment to the world. "Seventy percent of American people think we should stay engaged in the world," he said. "We're being told that somehow America wants to walk away, not from our obligations but from our opportunities. Tell me, name me one consequential problem from global warming to the nuclear arms race that can be solved by us alone? Name me one."
Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: The Daily Pennsylvanian on 2020 presidential hopefuls

Kamala Harris on Free Trade : Feb 11, 2019
Opposed TPP for invalidating California environmental laws

Harris opposed the Trans-Pacific Partnership, though for different reasons than Trump did. During the 2016 election, she argued that its adoption meant "invalidating California's landmark climate change and environmental laws." She also argued that the agreement wasn't transparent.
Click for Kamala Harris on other issues.   Source: Council on Foreign Relations on 2020 candidates

Kamala Harris on Crime : Feb 5, 2019
Ex-felons re-enter society, instead of broken justice system

We need our leaders to speak truth about climate change and about our broken criminal justice system.

We need an America where no mother or father has to teach their son that people may stop him or kill him because of the color of his skin.

The strength of our union is in our diversity and our unity. We see the State of our Union in the formerly incarcerated individual who re-enters society looking to contribute and in the DREAMer who pursues her future in the face of uncertainty.

Click for Kamala Harris on other issues.   Source: Democratic prebuttal to the 2019 State of the Union speech

Bernie Sanders on Energy & Oil : Feb 5, 2019
We have 12 years to transform to sustainable energy

As important as it is to respond to what President Trump said [in the State of the Union speech], it is even more important to discuss what Trump refused to talk about--which happens to include some of the most important issues facing our country and the world.

How can a president of the United States give a State of the Union speech and not mention climate change when the leading scientists of the world tell us that climate change is real, is caused by human activity, and is already causing devastating harm in the United States and in much of the world. Further, they tell us that we have a very short 12 years in order to transform our energy system away from fossil fuel and into energy efficiency and sustainable energy if we are going to have a planet that is healthy and habitable for our kids and grandchildren.

Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: Progressive response to 2019 State of the Union speech

Kamala Harris on Energy & Oil : Jan 22, 2019
Climate change important, but not only issue

On the issue of climate change: "Every parent wants to know that their child can drink clean water and breathe clean air. And that same parent wants to know that they're able to bring home enough money with one job to pay their bills and pay their rent, and put food on the table instead of having to work two or three jobs," she said. "Every person wants to know that there will be a criminal-justice system that is fair to all people, regardless of their race."
Click for Kamala Harris on other issues.   Source: The Atlantic, "Pick a Lane," on 2020 Democratic primary

Kamala Harris on Energy & Oil : Jan 21, 2019
Don't withdraw from the Paris climate accord

Click for Kamala Harris on other issues.   Source: PBS News hour on 2020 Presidential hopefuls

Tulsi Gabbard on Energy & Oil : Jan 14, 2019
No more fossil fuels for electricity by 2050

One of the most aggressive pieces of climate change legislation in Congress, Gabbard's "OFF Fuels for a Better Future Act" would mandate a dramatic move away from fossil fuels. The plan would require electric utilities to use 80 percent renewable resources by 2027 and 100 percent by 2035. In addition, it would set similar goals for car emissions, mandating zero emissions by 2050. Finally, it would end all subsidies and tax breaks for fossil fuels and it would ban fracking.
Click for Tulsi Gabbard on other issues.   Source: PBS News hour on 2020 Presidential hopefuls

Kamala Harris on Energy & Oil : Jan 8, 2019
Climate change is a national security threat to America

When you speak to experts on international conflicts, you will find that they look at climate change as a national security threat--a "threat multiplier" that will exacerbate poverty and political instability, creating conditions that enable violence, despair, even terrorism. An unstable, erratic climate will beget an unstable, erratic world.

For example, climate change will lead to droughts. Droughts will lead to famine. Famine will drive desperate people to leave their homes in search of sustenance. Massive flows of displaced people will lead to refugee crises. Refugee crisis will lead to tension and instability across borders.

The hard truth is that climate change is going to cause terrible instability and desperation, and that will put American national security at risk. That's why as part of President Obama's national security strategy, climate change was identified as a national security threat of the highest priority.

Click for Kamala Harris on other issues.   Source: The Truths We Hold, by Kamala Harris, p.244-5

Bernie Sanders on Energy & Oil : Nov 25, 2018
No more debate on climate change; it's here & costs $100Bs

Q: The Trump administration issued a new report, a really sharp warning about the immediate danger of climate change. What action will Congress take?

SANDERS: Well, what Congress should do is move aggressively in listening not only to this report from the Trump administration but from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change which tells us that climate change is already doing irreparable harm all over this planet. What Congress has got to do is take Trump on, take the fossil fuel industry on, and transform our energy system away from fossil fuel, to energy efficiency and sustainable energies like solar and wind.

Q: The report estimates knocking as much as 10% off the size of the U.S. economy by the end of this century because of related costs.

SANDERS: The debate is over about the reality of climate change and the incredible and costly harm it's going to do to this country. We are talking about hundreds of billions of dollars in damage that we're going to have to pay for.

Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: CBS Face the Nation 2018 interviews of 2020 hopefuls

Marco Rubio on Energy & Oil : Oct 14, 2018
Address rising sea levels by using natural gas & nuclear

Q: There is scientific consensus that warmer waters due to climate change are making storms such as Hurricane Michael [which devastated Florida this week] even more devastating. A new report from the U.N. outlined a dire global forecast within the next 20 years; Florida could lose more than one million homes by the end of the century due to rising sea levels because of climate change, which they say is manmade. What do you say to constituents who ask, why aren't you one of the leaders in Congress on this issue?

RUBIO: I would say that that's not true. We are. We have funded this study in Congress to better understand sea level rise and changes in the climate, those are measurable. From a policy-maker [perspective], the question is, what policies can we change to deal with that human activity? If you look at U.S. today, we're cleaner than we used to be. Natural gas is a clean source. Nuclear energy is very clean. But you have to fight the same people to approve of that.

Click for Marco Rubio on other issues.   Source: CNN 2018 interviews of 2020 hopefuls

Marco Rubio on Energy & Oil : Oct 14, 2018
Climate change is reality, but we're a country, not a planet

Q: In the wake of Hurricane Michael should Republicans stop questioning the science behind climate change?

RUBIO: Climate & sea level rise, these are measurable things. So it's not even a scientific debate. At some point, it's just a reality debate. You can measure whether sea levels are higher than they used to be, warmer than used to be and the like. As a policymaker, the fundamental question is, what can we do about it? And if, in fact, humans are contributing to that, what public policy can we pursue that does not destroy your economy and can be effective.

Q: Are there are mitigation efforts you can take with greenhouse gases?

RUBIO: The increases come from the developing world and in other places. We're not a planet, we're a country. The debate has not been always about whether or not it's human contribution. It's about whether the public policies that are being advocated would be effective, in light of the fact that in other places carbon emissions continue to grow.

Click for Marco Rubio on other issues.   Source: CBS Face the Nation 2018 interviews of 2020 hopefuls

Donald Trump on Energy & Oil : Oct 14, 2018
Climate change isn't a hoax, but don't spend trillions on it

President Trump is backing off his claim that climate change is a hoax but says he doesn't know if it's manmade. Trump said he doesn't want to put the US at a disadvantage in responding to climate change: "I think something's happening. Something's changing and it'll change back again," he said. "I don't think it's a hoax. I think there's probably a difference. But I don't know that it's manmade. I will say this: I don't want to give trillions & trillions of dollars. I don't want to lose millions & millions of jobs."

Trump called climate change a hoax in November 2012 stating, "The concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive." He later said he was joking about the Chinese connection, but in years since continued to call global warming a hoax.

As far as climate "changing back," temperature records kept by NASA show that the world hasn't had a cooler-than-average year since 1976 or a cooler-than-normal month since 1985.

Click for Donald Trump on other issues.   Source: America OnLine news on 2018 Trump Administration

Marco Rubio on Energy & Oil : Oct 14, 2018
Solar panels are not realistic; focus on mitigation

Q: In 20 years, are you going to be able to say to our children, "these are the things that I pushed for in Congress to help mitigate climate change"?

RUBIO: We're cleaner than we used to be. Natural gas is a clean source. Nuclear energy is very clean. But no matter what we do with laws--if, tomorrow, let's say we went to all solar panels and did all that stuff, which is not realistic, this trend [of rising sea levels] would still continue. And so we're going to have to do something about the impact that it's having on low-level coastal areas. And that means mitigation, hardening--how we manage water. We have been working on that very hard and continue to, strategies to mitigate against those factors that are going to be in place no matter what happens with our energy policy. But I'm also not going to destroy our economy. There's a reality here and there's a balance on that end of it that we need to be focused on.

Click for Marco Rubio on other issues.   Source: CNN 2018 interviews of 2020 hopefuls

Ron DeSantis on Energy & Oil : Oct 9, 2018
No carbon tax; no wind energy subsidy

Q: Consider climate change a serious threat?

Ron DeSantis (R): Mixed. "I don't know if it's because of my activity, your activity, but.we've got to deal with it." Opposed resolution saying greenhouse gases contributed to climate change.

Andrew Gillum (D): Climate change is a real & urgent threat. Transition Florida to clean energy.

Q: Limit or tax production of greenhouse gases?

DeSantis: No. Voted against any potential carbon tax as negatively impacting economy, voted against greenhouse gas emission standards, & to cut EPA funding.

Gillum: Yes. Sees Trump withdrawal from Paris Climate accord as "disturbingly reckless."

Q: Government support for renewable energy?

DeSantis: No. Opposed continued wind energy subsidy, calling it "anti-competitive & economically harmful."

Gillum: Yes. "Transition Florida to clean energy as rapidly as possible."

Click for Ron DeSantis on other issues.   Source: 2018 CampusElect.org Issue Guide on Florida Governor race

Tim Walz on Energy & Oil : Oct 9, 2018
Climate change is real and urgent

Q: Consider climate change a critical threat?

Jeff Johnson (R): No. Says climate is changing naturally and human involvement is debatable.

Tim Walz (D): Yes. Sees climate change as real and urgent.

Q: Should the government limit the levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere?

Johnson: No. Believes that a single country's efforts to mitigate climate change would have only a "small effect" & "we don't need to reorder our economy based on climate change."

Walz): Yes. Supported legislation to restrict carbon emissions. Opposed Trump's decision to withdraw from Paris Climate Agreement.

Q: Support government subsidies for renewable energy?

Johnson: Questions Minnesota's mandates on producing renewable fuels like ethanol & biodiesel, but promises not to end them if elected.

Walz: Yes. Wants to expand the Renewable Energy Standard, so Minnesota will get at least 50% of its energy from renewables by 2030, up from 21% now.

Click for Tim Walz on other issues.   Source: 2018 CampusElect.org Issue Guide on Minnesota Governor race

Marianne Williamson on Energy & Oil : Jul 24, 2018
Massive effort to combat effects of climate change

Climate change denial is moving irretrievably into the dustbin of history's worst ideas. American citizens--if not yet the majority of politicians currently in power--are ready to embark upon a massive effort to combat the effects not only of catastrophic weather conditions, but also the effects of climate change denial on our environmental and political policies. The American people are being vastly underserved by America's rejection of the Paris Climate Accord.
Click for Marianne Williamson on other issues.   Source: Healing the Soul of America, by Marianne Williamson, p.178

Donald Trump on Energy & Oil : May 29, 2018
OpEd: US is only country out of 197 to reject Paris accord

The US government has completely abdicated its role as a leader in the effort to slow and ultimately reverse climate change. In 2017, the Trump administration shocked the world by rejecting the Paris climate agreement--the only country out of 197 to do so. This is bad not only for the environment but also for our economy. We should be positioning ourselves to be the leader in the new energy economy. Instead, our government refuses to acknowledge that climate change is occurring.
Click for Donald Trump on other issues.   Source: The Right Answer, by Rep. John Delaney, p. 81

Bernie Sanders on Environment : Apr 1, 2018
Leave a planet to our kids that is healthy & habitable

Q: You sit on Environment Committee and you've been a harsh critic of EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt. He's facing a number of questions about ethics--

SANDERS: The issue goes well beyond that problem. Climate change is already devastating, and yet we have a president and a head of the EPA who do not even recognize reality of climate change. And over the last number of years we have made success against air pollution and against water pollution. We have made some success in transforming our energy system. And the idea to go back and listen to the short term needs of the coal industry or the oil industry makes no sense to me at all. Look, here is the truth. What the scientific community is telling us is that climate change is one of the great environmental crises facing this planet. And if we don't get a handle on that, we're going to leave a planet to our kids that is not healthy or habitable. We've got to address that. The Trump administration is moving in exactly the wrong direction.

Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: CBS Face the Nation 2018 interviews of 2020 hopefuls

Bernie Sanders on Energy & Oil : Sep 21, 2017
Climate change is issue for entire international community

At a time when climate change is causing devastating problems here in America and around the world, foreign policy is about whether we work with the international community--with China, Russia, India and countries around the world-- to transform our energy systems away from fossil fuel to energy efficiency and sustainable energy. Sensible foreign policy understands that climate change is a real threat to every country on earth, that it is not a hoax, and that no country alone can effectively combat it. It is an issue for the entire international community, and an issue that the United States should be leading in, not ignoring or denying.
Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: Westminster College speech in Where We Go From Here, p. 94

Donald Trump on Energy & Oil : Mar 28, 2017
Revive the coal industry; end efforts to curb carbon

President Trump, flanked by company executives and miners, signed a long-promised executive order to nullify President Barack Obama's climate change efforts and revive the coal industry, effectively ceding American leadership in the international campaign to curb the dangerous heating of the planet.

Trump made clear that the United States had no intention of meeting the commitments that his predecessor had made to curb planet-warming carbon dioxide pollution, turning denials of climate change into national policy. Trump directed the Environmental Protection Agency to start the complex and lengthy legal process of withdrawing and rewriting the Obama-era Clean Power Plan, which would have closed hundreds of coal-fired power plants, frozen construction of new plants and replaced them with vast new wind and solar farms.

"C'mon, fellas. You know what this is? You know what this says?" Trump said to the miners. "You're going back to work."

Click for Donald Trump on other issues.   Source: N.Y.Times on 2017 Trump Administration

Bernie Sanders on Energy & Oil : Nov 15, 2016
Cut carbon 40% by 2030 and 80% by 2050

By combating climate change and transforming our energy system away from fossil fuels and into energy efficiency and sustainable energy, we not only help lead the world in saving the planet, but we create an extraordinary number of good-paying jobs.

We have a short window of time to dramatically cut the greenhouse gases that cause global warming. I have laid out a plan to cut U.S. carbon pollution by at least 40 percent by 2030 and 80 percent by 2050 from 1990 levels by establishing a tax on carbon, aggressively implementing energy efficiency efforts, quickly moving away form fossil fuels, and deploying historic levels of new renewable energy like wind, solar, and geothermal. This is an absolutely and necessarily achievable goal. It is also a huge opportunity in terms of strengthening our economy and creating jobs.

Energy efficiency truly is a win-win-win in the fight against climate change, in terms of reducing energy use, saving consumers money, and creating jobs.

Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: Our Revolution, by Bernie Sanders, p. 251

Bernie Sanders on Energy & Oil : Nov 15, 2016
Pushed energy efficiency block grants

As part of the 2009 stimulus package, working with Senator Bob Menendez of New Jersey, we passed funding for the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant Program. This legislation, strongly supported by the U.S. Conference of Mayors, has been one of the government's major efforts to combat climate change. It provided billions of dollars for communities all across the country to move toward energy efficiency and sustainable energy. In Vermont, a number of schools throughout the state were able to use that money to place solar panels on their rooftops. This not only cut carbon emissions, but saved schools money on their electric bills.
Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: Our Revolution, by Bernie Sanders, p. 45

Jill Stein on Energy & Oil : Oct 9, 2016
Climate change is humanity's greatest existential threat

Climate change is the greatest existential threat that humanity has ever faced. Here is how we will address it:
Click for Jill Stein on other issues.   Source: ScienceDebate.org: 20 questions for 2016 presidential race

Donald Trump on Energy & Oil : Oct 9, 2016
Focus on disease & clean water, not "climate change"

Q: What are your views on climate change?

TRUMP: There is still much that needs to be investigated in the field of "climate change." Perhaps the best use of our limited financial resources should be in dealing with making sure that every person in the world has clean water. Perhaps we should focus on eliminating lingering diseases around the world like malaria. Perhaps we should focus on efforts to increase food production to keep pace with an ever-growing world population. Perhaps we should be focused on developing energy sources and power production that alleviates the need for dependence on fossil fuels. We must decide on how best to proceed so that we can make lives better, safer and more prosperous.

CLINTON: When it comes to climate change, the science is crystal clear. Climate change is an urgent threat and a defining challenge of our time.

JILL STEIN: Climate change is the greatest existential threat that humanity has ever faced.

Click for Donald Trump on other issues.   Source: ScienceDebate.org: 20 questions for 2016 presidential race

Jill Stein on Energy & Oil : Oct 9, 2016
Halt any investment in fossil fuel infrastructure

Q: On Climate Change: Is human activity causing climate change? Should government limit greenhouse gas emissions?

Clinton: Yes on both: "an urgent threat and a defining challenge of our time." Supports EPA coal plant restrictions.

Trump: No on both. "Climate change is a hoax." "Cancel Paris climate agreement." Opposes EPA coal plant restrictions.

Johnson: Humans probably cause climate change, but not the role of government to regulate.

Stein: Yes on both. "Halt any investment in fossil fuel infrastructure."

Q: On Climate change: Support renewable energy subsidies?

Clinton: Yes.

Trump: No. Let market decide.

Johnson: Unclear. In 2012 endorsed a resolution for renewable tax credits, more recently said wouldn't subsidize wind energy.

Stein: Yes. Enact an emergency Green New Deal.

Click for Jill Stein on other issues.   Source: CampusElect Voter Guide to 2016 Presidential race

Jill Stein on Government Reform : Sep 27, 2016
No money from lobbyists; No money from SuperPACs

I am the only candidate in this race who is not taking money from lobbyists, from corporations--I do not have a super PAC to coordinate with or not. I'm the one candidate that actually has the freedom to stand up for what the American people are clamoring for. That means an emergency jobs program, which will solve the emergency of climate change. It means bailing out the students, like they bailed out the crooks on Wall Street who crashed the economy. It's time to bail out the victims.
Click for Jill Stein on other issues.   Source: DemocracyNow interview on First 2016 Presidential Debate

Donald Trump on Energy & Oil : Sep 26, 2016
America invested in solar panels and it was a disaster

CLINTON: Some country is going to be the clean-energy superpower of the 21st century. Donald thinks that climate change is a hoax perpetrated by the Chinese.

TRUMP: I did not--

CLINTON: I think it's real. I think science is real.

TRUMP: I do not say that.

CLINTON: And I think it's important that we deal with it, both at home & abroad. Here's what we can do. We can deploy a half a billion more solar panels. We can have enough clean energy to power every home. We can build a new modern electric grid. That's a lot of jobs; that's a lot of new economic activity.

TRUMP: She talks about solar panels. We invested in a solar company, our country. That was a disaster. They lost plenty of money on that one. Now, look, I'm a great believer in all forms of energy, but we're putting a lot of people out of work. Our energy policies are a disaster. Our country is losing so much in terms of energy, in terms of paying off our debt. You can't do what you're looking to do with $20 trillion in debt.

Click for Donald Trump on other issues.   Source: First 2016 Presidential Debate at Hofstra University

Jill Stein on Energy & Oil : Aug 8, 2016
Green New Deal to turn the tide on climate change

Click for Jill Stein on other issues.   Source: Stein-Baraka platform on 2016 presidential campaign website

Mike Pence on Energy & Oil : Jul 14, 2016
Climate change is not a resolved issue in science

Pence was asked if he is "convinced that climate change is man-made." Pence responded: "I don't know that that is a resolved issue in science today. Just a few years ago, we were talking about global warming. We haven't seen a lot of warming lately. I remember back in the '70s we were talking about the coming ice age." [MSNBC.com, 2/21/14]

Pence similarly stated on the May 5, 2009, edition of MSNBC's Hardball that "I think the science is very mixed on the subject of global warming."

In July 2014, Pence sent a letter to Indiana's congressional delegation encouraging them to defund the Environmental Protection Agency's Clean Power Plan, which fights climate change by placing the first-ever federal limits on carbon pollution from power plants. Pence has since indicated that he will comply with the Clean Power Plan if it is upheld by the Supreme Court, but Indiana remains one of the states challenging the plan's legality. [The Hill, 7/10/14; Post-Tribune, 6/25/16; ClimateWire, 2/26/16]

Click for Mike Pence on other issues.   Source: Media Matters, "What Media Should Know," on 2016 Veepstakes

Bernie Sanders on Energy & Oil : Jul 9, 2016
Tax carbon, methane, and other greenhouse gases

[After the 2016 primaries], we were victorious in including amendments in the platform that made it the policy of the Democratic Party to fight for:All of these progressive policies were at the heart of our campaign, and I was very proud of the accomplishment of our platform-writing team.
Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: Where We Go From Here, by B. Sanders, p.16-7, on 2016 DNC

Bernie Sanders on Energy & Oil : Mar 9, 2016
End fracking in the US

I hope that Secretary Clinton would join me if we are serious about climate change, about imposing a tax on carbon on the fossil fuel industry and making massive investments in energy efficiency and sustainable energy. I hope you'll join me in ending fracking in the United States of America.
Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: 2016 PBS Democratic primary debate in Miami

Jill Stein on Energy & Oil : Jan 12, 2016
Climate change causes record storms, floods, and drought

Meanwhile, climate change is accelerating off the charts with record storms, heat, fires and floods across the country while California's drought threatens the fruit and vegetable supply for the nation. Lethal impacts have already been set in motion that require emergency action--the breakup of the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, permafrost melt, mass extinctions, and marine food chain disruption.
Click for Jill Stein on other issues.   Source: Green Party response to 2016 State of the Union speech

Jill Stein on Energy & Oil : Jan 12, 2016
All of the above policy puts fossil fuels above all

Despite much hot air about climate change, Democrats' "all of the above" energy policy has actually put fossil fuels above all. While Obama's policies increased renewables to a scant 5% of the US energy supply, this small portion has been overwhelmed by Obama's massive expansion of fracking and oil and gas extraction, both offshore and on public lands. Even as Obama boasted about the toothless Paris agreement that would allow a catastrophic 3 degrees Celsius temperature rise, Democrats--as well as Republicans--were trashing the climate by lifting the ban on oil exports (equivalent to building 135 new coal power plants), and expediting permits for fracking. Without any help from the Republicans, Obama alone gave a secret executive thumbs up to the major new fracked gas Gulf Trace Pipeline.
Click for Jill Stein on other issues.   Source: Green Party response to 2016 State of the Union speech

Jill Stein on Technology : Jan 12, 2016
Green New Deal for efficient public transportation

The economic and climate crises can be solved together, with a Green New Deal--an emergency WWII-style mobilization to revive the economy, turn the tide on climate change, and make wars for oil obsolete. It creates 20 million jobs to achieve 100% renewable energy by 2030. It creates efficient public transportation and local sustainable food systems, repairs critical infrastructure, and restores ecosystems. It immediately ends all new fossil fuel infrastructure, exploration and extraction-- including fracking, offshore drilling, extraction on public lands and in the Arctic. And it creates a planned, orderly transition to a decentralized, democratically controlled energy system, including public ownership of energy resources and infrastructure.

The Green New Deal will fund itself through massive health savings by ending pollution and improving food quality, with military savings from making wars for oil obsolete, and with savings from reductions in the cost of energy.

Click for Jill Stein on other issues.   Source: Green Party response to 2016 State of the Union speech

Bernie Sanders on Environment : Nov 15, 2015
Climate change will lead to international security crises

Q: You mentioned that climate change in fact is related to terrorism. Can you talk about that?

SANDERS: Well, that's what the CIA and the Department of Defense tell us. If we are going to see an increase in drought and flooding and extreme weather as a result of climate change, what that means is that peoples all over the world are going to be fighting over limited natural resources. When you have drought, when people can't grow their crops, they're going to migrate into cities. And when people migrate into cities, and they don't have jobs, there's going to be a lot more instability, a lot more unemployment. And people will be subject to the types of propaganda that al Qaeda and ISIS are using right now. I think, when we talk about all of the possible ravages of climate change, which, to my mind, is just a huge planetary crisis, increased international conflict is one of the issues that we have got to appreciate will happen.

Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: CBS Face the Nation 2015 coverage:2016 presidential hopefuls

Bernie Sanders on Energy & Oil : Nov 14, 2015
Climate change partly causes rise of terrorist groups

Q: You say you want to rid the planet of ISIS. In the previous debate you said the greatest threat to national security was climate change. Do you still believe that?

SANDERS: Absolutely. In fact, climate change is directly related to the growth of terrorism. And if we do not get our act together and listen to what the scientists say, you're going to see countries all over the world--this is what the CIA says--they're going to be struggling over limited amounts of water, limited amounts of land to grow their crops ask you're going to see all kinds of international conflict.

Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: 2015 CBS Democratic primary debate in Iowa

Chris Christie on Energy & Oil : Nov 8, 2015
Keystone pipeline would have minimal environmental impact

Q: President Obama rejected the Keystone pipeline on Friday, after seven years of study. He says it would undercut our global leadership on fighting climate change.

CHRISTIE: Interesting, the president is interested in global leadership, and the only thing he's interested in global leadership on is a radical environmental liberal policy, which is what he's doing. Did anybody think for the last seven years he was ever going to approve it? Despite the fact that the State Department said it won't have a big environmental impact, and so does the EPA administrator. This president is a radical environmental liberal. And when I'm president, we'll build the Keystone pipeline if the Canadians are still interested.

Click for Chris Christie on other issues.   Source: Fox News Sunday 2015 Coverage of 2016 presidential hopefuls

Donald Trump on Energy & Oil : Nov 3, 2015
Green energy is just an expensive feel-good for tree-huggers

There has been a big push to develop alternative forms of energy--so-called green energy--from renewable sources. That's a big mistake. To begin with, the whole push for renewable energy is being driven by the wrong motivation, the mistaken belief that global climate change is being caused by carbon emissions. If you don't buy that--and I don't--then what we have is really just an expensive way of making the tree-huggers feel good about themselves.

The most popular source of green energy is solar as several decades after installing solar panels to get your money back. That's not exactly what I would call a good investment. Even if that number is only half right, what kind of investment do you want to make that takes 20 years before you break even

Click for Donald Trump on other issues.   Source: Crippled America, by Donald Trump, p. 65

Bernie Sanders on Energy & Oil : Oct 13, 2015
Climate change is a moral issue: tax on carbon

Pope Francis made this point. This [climate change] is a moral issue. The scientists are telling us we need to move boldly. I am proud that, along with Senator Boxer, a few years ago, we introduced the first piece of climate change legislation which called for a tax on carbon. Nothing is gonna happen unless we [deal] with campaign finance reform, because the fossil fuel industry is funding the Republican Party, which denies the reality of climate change. The future of the planet is at stake.
Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: 2015 CNN Democratic primary debate in Las Vegas

Bernie Sanders on Energy & Oil : Oct 13, 2015
Address climate change so we can leave planet to our kids

Q [to all]: What is the greatest national security threat to the United States?

CHAFEE: It's certainly the chaos in the Middle East. And it all started with the Iraq invasion.

O'MALLEY: I believe that nuclear Iran remains the biggest threat, along with the threat of ISIL; climate change, of course, makes cascading threats.

CLINTON: I think it has to be continued threat from the spread of nuclear material that can fall into the wrong hands.

WEBB: Our greatest long-term strategic challenge is our relation with China.

Q: Senator Sanders, greatest national security threat?

SANDERS: The scientific community is telling us that if we do not address the global crisis of climate change, transform our energy system away from fossil fuel to sustainable energy, the planet that we're going to be leaving our kids and our grandchildren may well not be habitable. That is a major crisis.

Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: 2015 CNN Democratic primary debate in Las Vegas

Bernie Sanders on Energy & Oil : Oct 11, 2015
Opposed Keystone Pipeline from day one

I believe that climate change is the great global crisis that we face, environmental crisis. From day one, I opposed the Keystone Pipeline because I believe that if you're serious about climate change, you don't encourage the excavation and transportation of very dirty oil. That was my view from day one.
Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: Meet the Press 2015 interview moderated by Chuck Todd

Donald Trump on Health Care : Sep 22, 2015
Criticizes immunizations for children, and other science

Trump is often ruled by the needy child who resides in his psyche and would rather get negative attention than be ignored. Of course Trump does profit financially as he gives this part of himself free rein, and he has little patience for reflection or analysis. He just presses on, defying science with his criticism of immunizations for children and battling against the facts on climate change.

Trump has denied facts others accept and pushed the limits of propriety throughout his long and hyperactive life. In his parents' home, at school, and in the worlds of business and politics, he has continually asserted his superiority with only the barest hint of doubt.

Click for Donald Trump on other issues.   Source: Never Enough by M. D'Antonio, p. 4

Donald Trump on Health Care : Sep 22, 2015
Ebola virus in America is Obama's fault

Trump could bypass the gatekeepers in the press to reach people directly with his messages. Trump said he did own writing online, and given the wide range of tones in his comments, this seemed true. A devoted tweeter, his online statements address everything from a doctor in New York with the Ebola virus--"Obama's fault"--to the notion that the Big Apple could actually benefit from global warming, if the phenomenon is real, because it suffers from uncomfortable cold snaps in the winter.
Click for Donald Trump on other issues.   Source: Never Enough, by Michael D`Antonio, p.331

Marco Rubio on Energy & Oil : Sep 16, 2015
Addressing global warming would destroy our economy

Q: When Reagan was president, there were dire warnings about the ozone layer shrinking. Reagan urged skeptics to come up with a plan and "do it as an insurance policy in case the scientists are right." Why not take out an insurance policy?

RUBIO: Because we're not going to destroy our economy. We are not going to make America a harder place to create jobs in order to pursue policies that will do absolutely nothing: nothing to change our climate, to change our weather. So the bottom line is, I am not in favor of any policies that make America a harder place for people to live, or to work, or to raise their families.

Q: So would you call yourself a skeptic of climate change?

RUBIO: You can measure the climate. That's not the issue we're discussing. Here is what I'm skeptical of. I'm skeptical of the decisions that the left wants us to make. They will not do a thing to lower the rise of the sea. But what they will do is they will make America a more expensive place to create jobs.

Click for Marco Rubio on other issues.   Source: 2015 Republican two-tiered primary debate on CNN

Bernie Sanders on Energy & Oil : Sep 5, 2015
Combat climate skeptics with overwhelming evidence

Bernie has spent hundreds of hours vigorously debating and combating climate skeptic politicians. He has long been unsettled over some of his colleagues' responses to overwhelming scientific evidence and approaches to policies combating global warming through greenhouse gas emission reductions. He strongly believes the influence of lobbying is to blame for much of the climate change skepticism.

Bernie has repeatedly called climate skeptics out on their rejection of science. For example, during a Senate Environment and Public Works Committee in July 2014, Bernie said: "We have a major political party which is rejecting what the majority of the scientific community is saying."

It's no secret that large energy corporations fund scientists who work towards emphasizing the complexity of the knowledge surrounding climate change and its contribution to greenhouse-gas emissions. They also donate a lot of money to politicians. Bernie refuses to take money from any corporate donors.

Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: 2016 grassroots campaign website FeelTheBern.org, "Issues"

Bernie Sanders on Energy & Oil : Sep 5, 2015
Keystone pipeline transports the dirtiest fossil fuel

In 2015, through a "sense of congress" amendment on the early 2015 Keystone XL pipeline bill, Bernie forced fellow senators to state for the congressional record if they believe "that climate change is real, human-caused, and already creating devastating problems; that there's a brief window to act before 'irreparable harm' results; and that the United States should shift to cleaner energy sources."

Bernie was a congressional leader in opposing the Keystone XL pipeline in 2014 and recently applauded president Obama's veto promise on the measure.

Bernie said about other 2016 presidential candidates' environmental policies: "It is hard for me to understand how one can be concerned about climate change but not vigorously oppose the Keystone pipeline. We must make significant reduction in carbon emissions and break our dependency on fossil fuels. That is why I have helped lead the fight in the Senate against the Keystone pipeline, which would transport some of the dirtiest fossil fuel in the world."

Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: 2016 grassroots campaign website FeelTheBern.org, "Issues"

Bernie Sanders on Corporations : Aug 30, 2015
Wall Street business model is a fraud & led us to recession

Q: You said that the same old, same old cannot win.

SANDERS: People do not understand why the middle class of this country is collapsing at the same time as almost all of the new income and wealth is going to the top 1%. People do not like the idea that, as a result of Citizens United, our campaign finance system has become corrupt and politicians are dependent upon super PACs and billionaires for money. People want us to deal with climate change, make college affordable. Those are the issues I have been talking about.

Q: You also talk about taking on the billionaire class. Give us some specifics.

SANDERS: I think that the business model of Wall Street is fraud. And I think these guys drove us into the worst economic downturn into the modern history of America. I think they're at it again. I believe that, when you have so few banks with so much power, you have to not only reestablish Glass-Steagall, but you have got to break them up.

Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: CNN SOTU 2015 interview series: 2016 presidential hopefuls

Kamala Harris on Energy & Oil : Aug 27, 2015
Innovate smart solutions to climate change

Harris released the following statement on SB 350, the Clean Energy and Pollution Reduction Act, and SB 32, Climate Pollution Reduction Beyond 2020:

"Millions of Californians enjoy cleaner air and water because of our state's efforts to improve our environment. SB 350 and SB 32 build on this legacy by setting aggressive but achievable clean energy goals. These bills will ensure California continues to innovate smart solutions to climate change while growing our economy and improving public health."

Click for Kamala Harris on other issues.   Source: Imperial Valley News on 2016 California Senate race

Chris Christie on Energy & Oil : Jun 30, 2015
Anthropogenic climate change is real; but build Keystone XL

Climate Change: Climate change is real and at least partially man-made. Approve the Keystone Pipeline. Skeptical of cap and trade.

In May, Christie told a crowd in Keene, New Hampshire, that he believes climate change is real and caused at least in part by human activity. Previously, at a November 2010 town hall, the governor said he was not convinced about the role of mankind and needed more scientific proof. He opposes cap and trade--in 2011, Christie scrapped a regional cap and trade initiative that would have capped carbon dioxide emissions across 10 states.

On energy policy, Christie would approve the Keystone-XL Pipeline and has three times vetoed legislation geared to limit fracking. He signed a bill to expand renewable energy in New Jersey by bringing wind turbines to the state's coastline. A regulatory panel appointed by Christie has since blocked installation and there is debate over whether the governor still supports the idea.

Click for Chris Christie on other issues.   Source: PBS News Hour "2016 Candidate Stands" series

Donald Trump on Energy & Oil : Jun 28, 2015
Maybe some climate change is manmade, but not all

Q: The overwhelming majority of scientists say climate change is real and it's manmade.

A: Well, there could be some manmade, too. I mean, I'm not saying there's zero, but not nearly to the extent [others say]. When Obama gets up and said it's the number one problem of our country--and, if it is, why is it that we have to clean up our factories now, and China doesn't have to do it for another 30 or 35 years in their wonderful agreement, you know, our wonderful negotiators?

Click for Donald Trump on other issues.   Source: CNN SOTU 2015 interview series: 2016 presidential hopefuls

Jill Stein on Energy & Oil : Jun 25, 2015
Completely zero out climate emissions, as fast as possible

Q: Many climate scientists have pointed out that we are already "locked in" to a certain amount of climate change. So, why is a Green New Deal the answer?

A: I transitioned into doing climate work because from my knowledge of science and how you read the data, I certainly share the perspective that we can't take a single day for granted--that we have to work as fast as humanly possible to completely zero out climate emissions, but we have to do more than that as well. Restoring ecosystem resilience is part of the Green New Deal, which we don't often talk about because we're usually focused on the headlines: energy, transportation and food. Those are the big three for climate emissions, and they're critical for economic security, so that's kind of where the focus is.

Click for Jill Stein on other issues.   Source: Interview with Candice Bernd of Truthout.org

Jill Stein on Environment : Jun 25, 2015
Restore shorelines, deltas, forests, and grazing systems

We look at restoring shorelines, restoring deltas, restoring forests, restoring grazing systems & so on, because once you begin to do that, you incredibly magnify everything else that you do in regards to mitigating the impacts of climate change. To zero out climate emissions, you also have to accelerate natural carbon sequestration through ecosystems. That's the only way to do it reliably. There are many forms of restoration which also create jobs and save us humongous amounts of money in the long haul.
Click for Jill Stein on other issues.   Source: Interview with Candice Bernd of Truthout.org

Jill Stein on Environment : Jun 25, 2015
Moratorium on GMOs until they are proven safe

Protect Mother Earth: Lead on a global treaty to halt climate change. End destructive energy extraction: fracking, tar sands, offshore drilling, oil trains, mountaintop removal, and uranium mines. Protect our public lands, water supplies, biological diversity, parks, and pollinators. Label GMOs, and put a moratorium on GMOs and pesticides until they are proven safe. Protect the rights of future generations.
Click for Jill Stein on other issues.   Source: 2016 presidential campaign website, jill2016.com, "Plan"

Mike Pence on Energy & Oil : Jun 24, 2015
Against Obama's plan to battle climate change

Indiana will not comply with President Barack Obama's plan to battle climate change by requiring reductions in emissions from coal-fired power plants, Republican Gov. Mike Pence said Wednesday. The proposal as currently written, known as the Clean Power Plan, will make Indiana electricity more expensive and less reliable and hurt economic growth in Indiana and across the nation, Pence wrote in a letter to Obama.
Click for Mike Pence on other issues.   Source: Orange County Register on 2016 Indiana Governor race

Mike Huckabee on Environment : Jun 21, 2015
Climate change is questionable; address other issues instead

Q: Do you believe climate change is man-made?

HUCKABEE: Whether it's man-made or not, I know that when I was in college I was being taught that if we didn't act very quickly, that we were going to entering a global freezing. Go back and look at the covers of Time and Newsweek from the early '70s. We were told that if we didn't do something by 1980, we'd be popsicles. Now we're told that we're all burning up. Science is not as settled on that as it is on some things. I find it interesting. The Left has completely embraced the Pope's message on climate change.

Q: So what should be done?

HUCKABEE: Climate change is the wrong question. We should instead focus on good, stable energy prices and making America an exporter of energy not just for economic reasons but quite frankly to disrupt the balance of power with Russia, Iran, and the Saudis. This is a game changer. And America needs to be using the resources that it has to empower Americans, help poverty, and also change the global balance.

Click for Mike Huckabee on other issues.   Source: Meet the Press 2015 interviews of 2016 presidential hopefuls

Donald Trump on Energy & Oil : Jun 16, 2015
Climate change is a hoax

What does Donald Trump believe? Climate Change: It is a hoax.

Trump does not believe climate change is real, tweeting out his skepticism with strong language and calling it a hoax on Fox News in 2014. In a 2012 Twitter post which is no longer accessible, Trump charged that the concept of climate change was created by the Chinese to suppress the U.S. economy. In addition, Trump has expressed firm opposition to wind turbines, which he sees as an environmental and aesthetic problem.

Click for Donald Trump on other issues.   Source: PBS News Hour "2016 Candidate Stands" series

Mike Huckabee on Energy & Oil : May 5, 2015
Scientific predictions on climate change are inaccurate

On climate change, Huckabee says scientific predictions are inaccurate. In 2013, Huckabee wrote that climate change predictions have proved inaccurate, in a Facebook post that is no longer available online. He has not definitively rung in on whether humans have a role in climate change and questions its priority as an issue, comparing the problem to a sunburn on FOX News. In 2007, Huckabee told a climate change conference in New Hampshire that the nation has a responsibility to cut carbon emissions and that he then supported a "true cap-and-trade" system. In later years when asked about the comment, Huckabee said he supports a "voluntary" cap-and-trade system.
Click for Mike Huckabee on other issues.   Source: PBS News Hour "2016 Candidate Stands" series

Bernie Sanders on Energy & Oil : Apr 30, 2015
Charge companies for carbon emissions; then fund renewables

On climate change: Charge companies for carbon emissions.

Considered to be a "climate change hawk," Sanders argues that shifting global temperatures are a significant threat and caused by human activity. He has sponsored a bill which would charge companies for their carbon emissions and use some of the money raised to boost renewable energy technology.

Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: PBS News Hour "2016 Candidate Stands" series

Bernie Sanders on Energy & Oil : Mar 21, 2015
Transform to sustainable system & away from fossil fuels

The US must lead the world in tackling climate change and make certain that this planet is habitable for our children and grandchildren. We must transform our energy system away from fossil fuels and into energy efficiency and sustainable energies. Millions of homes and buildings need to be weatherized, our transportation system needs to be energy efficient and we need to greatly accelerate the progress we are already seeing in wind, solar, geothermal, biomass and other forms of sustainable energy. Transforming our energy system will not only protect the environment, it will create good paying jobs.

Unless we take bold action to address climate change, our children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren are going to look back on this period in history and ask a very simple question: Where were they? Why didn't the US lead the international community in cutting greenhouse gas emissions and preventing the devastating damage that the scientific community was sure would come?

Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: 2016 presidential campaign website, BernieSanders.com

Jill Stein on Energy & Oil : Feb 6, 2015
Make wars for oil obsolete: 100% renewables by 2030

We will lift up the bold solutions the American people are calling for:
Click for Jill Stein on other issues.   Source: 2016 presidential campaign website, Jill2016.com, "Announce"

Bernie Sanders on Energy & Oil : Jan 15, 2015
Weatherize millions of homes and buildings

Reversing Climate Change:
The US must lead the world in reversing climate change and make certain that this planet is habitable for our children and grandchildren. We must transform our energy system away from fossil fuels and into energy efficiency and sustainable energies. Millions of homes and buildings need to be weatherized, our transportation system needs to be energy efficient and we need to greatly accelerate the progress we are already seeing in wind, solar, geothermal, biomass and other forms of sustainable energy. Transforming our energy system will not only protect the environment, it will create good paying jobs.
Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: 12 Steps Forward, by Sen. Bernie Sanders

Marco Rubio on Abortion : May 14, 2014
Consensus that life begins at conception; so no abortion

Marco Rubio says pro-choice Democrats who criticize him for doubting man-made climate change should be questioned on why they support abortion: "Here's what I always get a kick out of, and it shows you the hypocrisy. All these people always wag their finger at me about science and settled science. Let me give you a bit of settled science that they'll never admit to," Rubio said. "The science is settled, it's not even a consensus, it is a unanimity, that human life beings at conception. So I hope the next time someone wags their finger about science, they'll ask one of these leaders on the left: 'Do you agree with the consensus of scientists that say that human life begins at conception?' I'd like to see someone ask that question."

The debate, however, isn't nearly as clear-cut as Rubio claims. So-called personhood bills have sparked debate on when a fetus should be considered an individual with full legal rights.

Click for Marco Rubio on other issues.   Source: Huffington Post 2014 coverage of 2016 presidential hopefuls

Marco Rubio on Energy & Oil : May 11, 2014
Human activity is not causing climate change

Q: Do you agree with the science on climate change?

RUBIO: I don't agree with the notion that somehow there are actions we can take today that would actually have an impact on what's happening in our climate. Our climate is always changing. And what they have chosen to do is take a handful of decades of research and say that this is now evidence of a longer-term trend that's directly and almost solely attributable to manmade activity, I do not agree with that.

Q: You don't buy it?

RUBIO: I don't know of any era in world history where the climate has been stable. Climate is always evolving, & natural disasters have always existed.

Q: You do not think that human activity, its production of CO2, has caused warming to our planet?

RUBIO: I do not believe that human activity is causing these dramatic changes to our climate the way these scientists are portraying it. And I do not believe that the laws that they propose we pass will do anything about it. Except it will destroy our economy.

Click for Marco Rubio on other issues.   Source: ABC This Week 2014 series of 2016 presidential hopefuls

Bernie Sanders on Immigration : Oct 17, 2013
Climate change lays groundwork for mass migration

Scientists are not the only people warning us about the danger of climate change. Hear what the Department of Defense has to say about the impact of climate change on international and national security. What they point out--and I think what every sensible person understands--is that when people are unable to grow the food they need because of drought, when flood destroys their homes, when people throughout the world are forced to struggle for limited natural resources in order to survive, this lays the groundwork for the migration of people and international conflict. That is what the Department of Defense tells us.
Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: The Essential Bernie Sanders, by Jonathan Tasini, p. 35

Joe Biden on Energy & Oil : May 9, 2013
Pushed cap-and-trade early; but $90B tax credits passed

Q: Why doesn't the Obama administration use the bully pulpit to talk about climate change like it does for gun control?

A: We have. In his inaugural address, the president said, "We will respond to the threat of climate change, knowing that the failure to do so would betray our children and future generations." In the very beginning, we decided that we had to move on this. And we thought, cap-and-trade. But it got shut down, even when we had a Democratic Congress. So from that point on, the president has been trying to figure out how he can use his executive authority to make some real changes.

Q: Despite the congressional opposition, do you feel the Obama administration has made inroads in the climate fight?

A: The thing I'm proudest of that we were able to get done in the first term was the Recovery Act. It had $90 billion in clean-energy programs. We had a lot of money going into research and development, and also tax credits for wind and solar energy.

Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: Douglas Brinkley in Rolling Stone Magazine

Joe Biden on Energy & Oil : Feb 4, 2013
Set out vision for young people to deal with global warming

I was impressed in the discussion [French President Hollande and I] had relative to climate change. The President pointed out that there is an obligation here that extends way beyond these administrations. There is a need to set out a vision for the young people in both our countries that we understand. It's a rallying cry that can be a call for a united effort and support in both our countries to deal with global warming.

President Obama is committed to do that. And he is going to have an interlocutor in John Kerry. There is no one in my country who has been, over the period of time he's been in the Senate, more concerned with or knowledgeable about the issues relating to global warming.

Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: Press Conference with V.P. Biden & French President Hollande

Jill Stein on Environment : Oct 31, 2012
EPA should apply science, free from polluters' influence

Jill Stein said today that the resignation of Lisa Jackson as head of the Environmental Protection Agency underscores the resistance of the Obama administration to dealing with climate change and the environment: "Pres. Obama said any action would have to take a back seat to getting the economy moving again. He just doesn't grasp that the path to full employment starts with building a clean energy future," noted Stein.

Jackson decided to leave due to her frustration over constant fights with the White House over climate change and the rejection of key environmental proposals such as regulating ozone. Obama last year decided to suspend EPA's new rules to reduce smog.

Stein added, "We need an EPA committed to protecting the environment, and to a transparent, democratic process within the agency. This is essential if the EPA is to apply science in the public interest, free from the corrupting influence of industry that has historically had too much influence over EPA scientific decisions."

Click for Jill Stein on other issues.   Source: FireDogLake.com, "Jill Stein Arrested", by Kevin Gosztola

Jill Stein on Energy & Oil : Oct 22, 2012
Fight against climate change instead of fighting for oil

OBAMA: One of the challenges over the last decade is we've done experiments in nation building in places like Iraq and Afghanistan. And we've neglected, for example, developing our own economy, our own energy sectors. It's very hard for us to project leadership around the world when we're not doing what we need to do here.

STEIN: Instead of fighting wars for oil, America will be leading the fight to put an end to climate change. In Afghanistan and Iraq, we have spent about $5 trillion. We have seen thousands and thousands of American lives lost, hundreds of thousands of civilian lives lost, about a trillion dollars a year being spent on a massive, bloated military-industrial-security budget. Instead, we need to cut that military budget, rightsize it to year 2000 levels, and build true security here at home, bringing our war dollars home.

Click for Jill Stein on other issues.   Source: Democracy Now! Expanded Third Obama-Romney 2012 debate

Jill Stein on Energy & Oil : Oct 16, 2012
Weatherizing homes creates jobs & addresses climate change

One of the ways to put people to work very quickly is in an emergency program to weatherize and to insulate our homes, government buildings, schools and businesses. And doing this, we can put people to work, especially low-income and people who may not even have a high school degree. So we can directly create jobs and, at the same time, meet the climate emergency, which also needs really dramatic, prompt solutions.
Click for Jill Stein on other issues.   Source: Democracy Now! Expanded Second Obama-Romney 2012 debate

Jill Stein on Health Care : Oct 16, 2012
75% of expenditures are sick care system, not healthcare

We support a Green New Deal, which will put everyone back to work at the same time that it puts a halt to climate change and it makes wars for oil obsolete. And as a medical doctor, I want to note that what is good for the economy and for the planet is also good for our health. So it really creates the infrastructure for real health with a local, sustainable food system; with fresh food; with public and active transportation that allows you to get your exercise on the way to school; and with clean, renewable energy that provides, effectively, pollution prevention. So we can get healthy and save an enormous amount of money, as well, by preventing [about] 75% of our expenditures under what's really a sick care system, not a healthcare system. We move to the fundamentals of health, as well, through the Green New Deal.
Click for Jill Stein on other issues.   Source: Democracy Now! Expanded Second Obama-Romney 2012 debate

Marco Rubio on Energy & Oil : Jun 19, 2012
I dislike cap-&-trade, but it is inevitable as national law

The previous summer the governor had issued a series of executive orders instituting global warming cap-and-trade regulations, which would become law unless the legislature overrode them. We passed a bill that instructed Florida's Dept. of Environmental Protection to create an outline of cap-and-trade plan for the state. However, the plan couldn't take effect unless the legislature approved it. The governor signed it because he could claim he got a signature initiative passed by the legislature. The legislature passed it because we knew we could stop it later.

[During the Senate primary], Crist falsely claimed I had supported cap and trade. He cited an interview in which I made the assumption that some form of cap and trade would eventually become national law. I suggested that Florida should prepare for the inevitable by adopting a policy of its own. But I didn't support cap and trade. I wrote an opinion piece denouncing the governor's executive orders shortly after he announced them.

Click for Marco Rubio on other issues.   Source: An American Son, by Marco Rubio, p.157-158

Chris Christie on Energy & Oil : Jun 5, 2012
Pulled out of ten-state Regional Greenhouse Gas program

Americans for Prosperity in 2010 circulated a document to politicians asking them not to support climate change legislation. Christie did not sign it. He did, however, pull out of the 10-state Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative program (RGGI). Christie called RGGI a failure that would result in higher energy taxes and render the state uncompetitive with neighbors not in the program such as Pennsylvania. RGGI was an effort by the supporting states to tackle climate change issues by charging companies for polluting emissions but allowing them to buy credits from firms that don't pollute, which would theoretically offer economic incentive to reduce reliance on fossil fuels.

Critics saw a pattern developing. Christie scaled back renewable energy goals, scaled back rebates for solar panels at residences, vetoed a bill that would have banned fracking, a process of using pressurized fluid to release gas and petroleum for extraction.

Click for Chris Christie on other issues.   Source: Rise to Power, by B. Ingle & M. Symons, p.240-241

Jill Stein on War & Peace : Feb 3, 2012
End the Oil Wars

Click for Jill Stein on other issues.   Source: 2012 Presidential Campaign website jillstein.org, "Brochure"

Jill Stein on Energy & Oil : Jan 29, 2012
We can't wait 4 more years to address climate change

Q: What about the recent debacle in Durban [the 2011 United Nations Climate Change Conference]?

A: This is another reason why we're running the campaign now--because if you follow the science, we don't have four years to wait. We really have to start tackling this now. It's really important for the climate and it's time that people put their politics where their values and science argue they ought to be. I think Obama supporters are really having a rude awakening right now. The US, as you know, is the largest per capita contributor to climate change and the direction the US pushes goes a long way toward determining what the rest of the world does, and from that perspective, dramatically downscaling carbon emissions goes a long way toward determining the global carbon budget and helps move global policy that way.

Click for Jill Stein on other issues.   Source: Interview with Steve Horn of Truthout.org

Jill Stein on Jobs : Jan 29, 2012
Stimulus spent $220K per job; I propose $20K per green job

The Green New Deal is an emergency jobs creation plan that addresses unemployment & also the climate. It's a win-win on all those fronts and is modeled after the New Deal that helped us get out of the Great Depression. It would jumpstart the economy as a green economy, instead of going back to the same old economy. It goes green and also relocalizes, and it jumpstarts, in particular, small businesses and co-operatives. And in so doing, it puts a stop to escalating climate change.

We're talking about green manufacturing, sustainable local agriculture, public transportation and clean renewable energy that has the added benefit of making wars for oil obsolete. The cost for Obama's stimulus package worked out to be about $220,000 per job created, because the mechanisms were indirect and relied a lot on tax incentives, which don't always get used to create jobs. This, instead, would be money used directly to create jobs and would be more like $20,000 per job created.

Click for Jill Stein on other issues.   Source: Interview with Steve Horn of Truthout.org

Joe Biden on Energy & Oil : Oct 2, 2008
Cause of global warming is clearly Man-made

Q: What is true and what is false about what we have heard about the causes of climate change?

PALIN: As governor of the nation's only Arctic state, Alaska feels & sees impacts of climate change more so than any other state. And we know that it's real. I'm not one to attribute every activity of man to the changes in the climate. There is something to be said also for man's activities, but also for the cyclical temperature changes on our planet. But there are real changes going on in our climate. And I don't want to argue about the causes. What I want to argue about is, how are we going to get there to positively affect the impacts?

BIDEN: Well, I think it is manmade. I think it's clearly manmade. If you don't understand what the cause is, it's virtually impossible to come up with a solution. We know what the cause is. The cause is manmade. That's the cause. That's why the polar icecap is melting.

Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: 2008 Vice Presidential debate against Gov. Sarah Palin

Joe Biden on Energy & Oil : Oct 2, 2008
Obama believes in investing in alternative energy

BIDEN: We have 3 percent of the world's oil reserves. We consume 25% of the oil. John has voted 20 times in the last decade-and-a-half against funding alternative energy sources, clean energy sources, wind, solar, biofuels. Obama believes by investing in clean coal and safe nuclear, we can not only create jobs in wind and solar here, we can export it.

PALIN: I was the first governor to form a climate change sub-cabinet to start dealing with the impacts. We've got to reduce emissions. John McCain is right there with an "all of the above" approach to deal with climate change impacts. As we rely more on other countries that don't care as much about the climate as we do, we're allowing them to produce and to emit and even pollute more than America would ever stand for. It's all the more reason that we have an "all of the above" approach, tapping into alternative sources of energy and conserving fuel, conserving our petroleum products and our hydrocarbons so that we can clean up this planet

Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: 2008 Vice Presidential debate against Sarah Palin

Joe Biden on Foreign Policy : Aug 27, 2008
The US is less secure and more isolated in recent history

Our country is less secure and more isolated that it has been any time it has in recent history. The Bush foreign policy has dug us into a very deep hole, with very few friends to help us climb out. For the last seven years, the administration has failed to face the biggest forces shaping this century. The emergence of Russia, China and India's great powers, the spread of lethal weapons, the shortage of secure supplies of energy, food and water. The challenge of climate change and the resurgence of fundamentalism in Afghanistan and Pakistan, the real central front in the war on terror. We once again see the consequences of the neglect of Russia challenging the very freedom of a new democratic country of Georgia. Barack and I will end that neglect. We will hold Russia accountable for its action and we will help Georgia rebuild. I have been on the ground in Georgia, Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and I can tell you in no uncertain terms, this administration's policy has been an abysmal failure.
Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: Speech at 2008 Democratic National Convention

Joe Biden on Energy & Oil : Nov 11, 2007
Supports cap-and-trade for greenhouse gases

On climate change Biden occupies what has become the conventional liberal middle-ground, supporting "a ‘cap-and-trade' approach to regulating emissions and investment in technologies" to reduce greenhouse gasses.
Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: The Contenders, by Laura Flanders, p.180

Mike Huckabee on Environment : May 3, 2007
Follow Boy Scout rule: leave earth better than we found it

Q: Thousands of reputable scientists have concluded with almost certainly that human activity is responsible for the warming of the Earth. Do you believe global warming exists?

A: The most important thing about global warming is this. Whether humans are responsible for the bulk of climate change is going to be left to the scientists, but it's all of our responsibility to leave this planet in better shape for the future generations than we found it. It's the old Boy Scout rule of the campsite: You leave the campsite in better shape than you found it. I believe that even our responsibility to God means that we have to be good stewards of this Earth, be good caretakers of the natural resources that don't belong to us, we just get to use them. We have no right to abuse them.

Click for Mike Huckabee on other issues.   Source: 2007 GOP primary debate, at Reagan library, hosted by MSNBC

Joe Biden on Energy & Oil : Apr 26, 2007
Make every automobile sold be a flex-fuel automobile

We have to make an equivalent of a Manhattan Project [on energy & climate change]. We have to fundamentally shift the way we do it. Barack and I have a bill to make sure that every automobile sold in the US is a flex-fuel automobile; every gas station in America, by the year 2009, has to have 10% of it's pumps pumping E85 ethanol.

We also have legislation in requiring we invest $100 million a year for the next couple of years in order to be able to find lithium battery technology to be able to power our cars.

We also have legislation talking about capping emissions. Cap them now; not wait. Cap them where they are now. Time's running out.

But you have to be willing to make multi-billion dollar investments over the next 10 years and set hard goals in order to be able to get to the point where we are no longer dependent.

Click for Joe Biden on other issues.   Source: 2007 South Carolina Democratic primary debate, on MSNBC

Bernie Sanders on Principles & Values : Jun 3, 2005
Current administration has numbed American outrage

The word outrage has lost its meaning! What does outrage mean when we have an administration that took us to war under false premises? What does outrage mean at a time when the United States has the most unfair gap between the rich and the poor of any industrialized nation? What does outrage mean when the White House and the Republican leadership are some of the few people in the entire world who do not understand the profound dangers of global warming?
Click for Bernie Sanders on other issues.   Source: 2005 Take Back America Conference

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Candidates on Energy & Oil:


2024 Presidential primary contenders:
Gov.Doug Burgum (R-ND)
Gov.Chris Christie (R-NJ)
Gov.Ron DeSantis (R-FL)
Larry Elder (R-CA)
Rep.Will Hurd (R-FL)
Gov.Nikki Haley (R-SC)
Gov.Asa Hutchinson (R-AR)
Perry Johnson (R-IL)
Mayor Steve Laffey (R-RI)
V.P.Mike Pence (R-IN)
Rep.Dean Phillips (D-MN)
Vivek Ramaswamy (R-)
Sen.Tim Scott (R-SC)
Secy.Corey Stapleton (R-MT)
Mayor Francis Suarez (R-FL)
Marianne Williamson (D-CA)
2024 Presidential Nominees:
Pres.Joe Biden (Democratic incumbent)
V.P.Kamala Harris (Democratic nominee)
Chase Oliver (Libertarian Party)
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. (Independent)
Dr.Jill Stein (Green Party)
Pres.Donald Trump (Republican nominee)
Sen.JD Vance (Republican V.P. nominee)
Gov.Tim Walz (Democratic V.P. nominee)
Dr.Cornel West (People's Party)

2024 Presidential primary also-ran's or never-ran's:
Ryan Binkley (R-TX)
Howie Hawkins (Green Party)
Joe Maldonado (Libertarian Party)
Sen.Bernie Sanders (D-VT)
Kanye West (Birthday Party)
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