Thanks to Trump, climate policy has a chance in 2024

It’s almost too obvious to state that a Harris victory in November would be an historic save for US climate policy. However, the stakes have never been higher, so it bears repeating. A Trump 2.0 would dismantle as much of Biden’s climate agenda as he possibly could—starting on Day 1. It would set US environmental policy back decades.

In the 2024 election, Trump’s opposition to clean energy and climate science may ironically be a good thing. According to ABC News and others, “inflation, foreign policy, and reproductive rights have dominated the national conversation, with environmental policy failing to emerge as a major ballot issue.”

Not for the first time, the greatest existential crisis of our time is listed on the under-card of voter motivators. However, Trump’s memetic use of the Green New Deal as a pillar of radical “woke” thinking will bring climate issues onto the presidential campaign stage. It will prove a tactical mistake for the ci-devant president and a gift to Harris and the Democrats, both during and after the election.

The Green New Deal is the name given to a proposed policy that wasn’t. That is, it wasn’t anything other than a 5K word resolution led by Representative Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and Senator Markey (D-MA), along with other progressive members of Congress.

The resolution calls upon the government to create an integrated climate-responsive program that increases resilience and reduces the harmful consequences of releasing greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. It says nothing about outlawing hamburgers, proposing “to build “’ trains to Europe, Hawaii and Australia’” and limiting people to having just “one car,’” as Mr. Trump has stated.

If politics is about the money, then Harris has strong economic arguments she can put forward in defense of the Democratic-only Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) legislation that’s providing significant economic benefits to red states. Republican congressional districts have received $161 billion in federal funds for new cleantech manufacturing projects. In comparison, Democratic districts have received just $42 billion. And it’s all because Vice President Harris cast the tie-breaking vote to deliver one of the most crucial climate bills in history.

The White House has stated that Biden’s climate and science “agenda has driven over $866 billion in private sector manufacturing and clean energy investments in the United States” through the IRA, the moderately bipartisan infrastructure bill, and the CHIPS and Science Act. According to a study by Climate Power, the investments have created over 334,000 jobs in industries powering the future.

The IRA and other of the administration’s climate-related investments are gifts to red states that will keep on giving. It’s a story that needs to be told on the national stage as it’s being under-reported in Trump-land.  But now, thanks to the former president, climate will climb towards the top of voter priorities.

In a year that has a 77 percent chance of being the hottest in history and with the increasing number of billion-dollar weather-related disasters, Harris and Walz have an extraordinary opportunity to reset the national climate dialogue—not just as an echo of the left but as a recognized component of today’s other critical concerns, including inflation, economic growth, and foreign involvements.

Although more closely aligned traditionally with the progressive side of the Democratic Party, Harris and Walz need to run and govern as moderates. Something they seem prepared to do in the case of energy and environment.

Zeke Miller, writing for AP News, reports that “Harris’ most pronounced policy moves have been to back away from liberal stances she took in her failed 2020 bid for the White House, including proposals to ban fracking. Harris has chosen a running mate whose record of climate-related policies and programs as Minnesota governor is impressive—notably because he accomplished things without a lock on the legislature.

By temperament and experience Harris and Walz are consensus builders. In terms of climate policy, it means that compromise is inevitable—more than that it is critical for getting things done and preventing America’s democracy from unravelling.

The relief rally Harris is benefitting from isn’t simply because of an unpopular president or because there are no longer two old white guys daring each other to duke it out behind the gym. The country is ready for a bit of rational discussion on climate and the host of other problems facing the nation.

However, it’s not just up to Harris and Walz to convince Americans of the critical need to respond to Earth’s warming and its causes. The progressive climate community needs to give them more than their votes in November—they need to be willing to allow them to moderate—in the many senses of that term—the climate debate until support begins to cross political lines in meaningful ways. That may mean supporting policies like permit reform that hold the same benefits for fossil fuels as for solar and wind. It means having faith in market forces to make the ultimate decision.

For the US to have any chance of transitioning to a low-carbon economy in anything approximating the next 25 years, it will need to be lifted from the trenches of the culture wars. The US cannot continue to spend equal time at the extremes, believing it will all balance out in the end. It doesn’t.