Sign In or Create an Account.

By continuing, you agree to the Terms of Service and acknowledge our Privacy Policy

Politics

Kamala Harris Doesn’t Have to Run on Climate

The campaign is not the point.

Kamala Harris.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

Two years ago this month, President Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act, which both his allies and adversaries agree is the most significant climate legislation in the country’s history. Yet despite this accomplishment, the urgency of the crisis, and the consensus within the Democratic Party on the need for aggressive climate action, you would have had to listen carefully to this week’s Democratic National Convention to catch much discussion of the issue.

It’s not that none of the speakers mentioned climate, but “mentioned” is about as far as most of them went. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, an original sponsor of the Green New Deal, didn’t mention climate in her DNC speech. Nor did Tim Walz, who has been one of the most aggressive governors in the country on the issue; among other things, he signed a bill requiring utilities to provide 100% clean electricity by 2040. Barack Obama, whose Clean Power Plan so angered his opponents that they set out to destroy the entire U.S. regulatory state, said only that “America can be and must be a force for good, discouraging conflict, fighting disease, promoting human rights, protecting the planet from climate change, defending freedom, brokering peace.”

There were meetings on climate strategy that occurred around the convention, but it wasn’t until the convention’s final night that climate really took the stage, with presentations from Interior Secretary Deb Haaland and Rep. Maxwell Frost of Florida, the youngest member of Congress. In Kamala Harris’ acceptance speech, it received only a single line, in which she said that Americans deserve “the freedom to breathe clean air and drink clean water and live free from the pollution that fuels the climate crisis.” That was all.

One might conclude (and some certainly have) that as a policy priority, climate has fallen a few rungs down on the Democratic agenda. But to my mind, that wouldn’t be quite correct. There has been an undeniable change in the party’s political calculus at moments like this one, but it needn’t cause those who care about the issue to panic.

Every activist would like their issue to be at the top of the political agenda, but especially in our current state of polarization, that usually means a big fight, with high stakes and the chance of both victory and defeat. At the moment, abortion is the issue Democrats want to elevate into that kind of fight, since they believe it can be used to pull voters from the middle and even the other major party into their camp. Republicans believe the same thing about immigration.

Democrats may not believe climate change has the same kind of power in voters’ minds. But that may not be such a bad thing.

After all, starting a big fight on an issue is only one path to policy change. Another is to place it within a broader agenda, keeping the part of your coalition that cares about it on board and ready to move forward should you win, without generating too much energetic opposition from your opponents. And that’s what climate wound up being at the Democratic convention: not a main course, not even a side dish, but rather an appealing political crouton tossed into a salad full of other policies and priorities.

That’s partially a product of Democrats’ legislative success: The passage of the IRA may have encouraged them to place the climate issue somewhat to the side. Many in the party feel that they got away with passing a sweeping law without the kind of knock-down, drag-out battle we saw around something like the Affordable Care Act, another important bill that squeaked by without a vote to spare. The debate within Congress over the IRA may have been intense — remember all the wrangling over whether Joe Manchin would give his assent? — but most Americans barely noticed. It was too complicated and too fraught with dull procedural details. That’s one reason that today, most voters say they haven’t heard much about the law (and some who claim they have are probably lying). Yet when its provisions are described to them, it garners overwhelming support.

In some ways, the IRA resembles the ACA, which Democrats correctly believed would grow more popular as its effects were felt. In climate as in health care, Democrats don’t have much appetite for another big battle; they’d rather make incremental additions in future legislation that build on what they managed to put into law. And they hope the Republicans who tried to defeat the bills won’t want to take the political risk of unwinding them.

Kamala Harris’ slogan may be “When we fight, we win,” but she doesn’t seem to want too much of a fight on climate. Likewise, environmental groups are pouring millions of dollars into ads supporting her candidacy, but many of them don’t actually focus on climate and mention “clean energy” only in passing. The people producing them have clearly calculated that what’s most important is not having their issue discussed in the campaign, but rather getting an administration that will allow the IRA and other laws with climate provisions such as the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law to continue to unspool, while regulatory agencies including the Environmental Protection Agency keep working on reducing emissions. If those bills do what they’re supposed to, they’ll create their own constituencies and political armor.

And if most of the public takes only occasional notice at campaign time? There’s nothing wrong with that. Campaigns are almost always superficial, and this one isn’t any different. It’s what happens afterward that matters.

Blue

You’re out of free articles.

Subscribe today to experience Heatmap’s expert analysis 
of climate change, clean energy, and sustainability.
To continue reading
Create a free account or sign in to unlock more free articles.
or
Please enter an email address
By continuing, you agree to the Terms of Service and acknowledge our Privacy Policy
Climate

The Bill Gates Era of Climate Giving Has Ended

Breakthrough Energy is winding down its policy and advocacy office, depriving the Inflation Reduction Act of a powerful defender.

Bill Gates.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

This is part of a Heatmap series on the “green freeze under Trump.

A major chapter in climate giving has ended.

Keep reading...Show less
Blue
Elon Musk.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images, Tesla

Tesla already looked beleaguered last week as a tumbling stock price tied to public anger at CEO Elon Musk wiped out more than a half-billion dollars in value. The slide erased all the gains the company had garnered since new Musk ally Donald Trump was reelected as president. On Monday the stock went into full freefall, losing 15% of its value in one day. By Tuesday, Trump had to pose with Tesla vehicles outside the White House to try to defend them.

With a crashing market valuation and rising rage against its figurehead, Tesla’s business is in real jeopardy, something that’s true regardless of Musk’s power in the federal government. If he can’t magically right the ship this time, this self-sabotaging MAGA turn will go down as one of the great self-owns.

Keep reading...Show less
Politics

AM Briefing: Climate Grants Terminated

On Lee Zeldin’s announcement, coal’s decline, and Trump’s Tesla promo

The EPA’s $20 Billion Climate Grants Have Been Terminated
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

Current conditions: Alaska just had its third-warmest winter on record • Spain’s four-year drought is nearing an end • Another atmospheric river is bearing down on the West Coast, triggering evacuation warnings around Los Angeles’ burn scars.

THE TOP FIVE

1. Zeldin terminates $20 billion in climate grants

EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin said yesterday he had terminated $20 billion in congressionally-approved climate change and clean energy grants “following a comprehensive review and consistent with multiple ongoing independent federal investigations into programmatic fraud, waste, abuse and conflicts of interest.”

Keep reading...Show less
Yellow