Greens go easy on Harris. But for how long?

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By Arianna Skibell

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Vice President Kamala Harris waves on stage, with balloons in front of her.

Vice President Kamala Harris accepts the Democratic presidential nomination on the last night of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago on Thursday.

Kamala Harris’ decision to dedicate a mere half-sentence to climate change in her 40-minute speech accepting the Democratic presidential nomination is perhaps unsurprising.

Despite casting the tie-breaking vote in 2022 for the country’s largest climate law, the vice president has largely avoided the subject since President Joe Biden dropped out of the race a month ago, writes Scott Waldman.

Thursday night was no exception. In talking about fundamental freedoms at stake in the election, Harris noted “the freedom to breathe clean air and drink clean water, and to live free from the pollution that fuels the climate crisis.” Earlier in the evening, the convention featured a 13-minute segment of speeches and videos in which speakers such as Interior Secretary Deb Haaland hailed the administration’s efforts to use record amounts of spending to fight climate change and create clean energy jobs.

The green groups’ calculation, political strategists say, is a simple one: Former President Donald Trump’s pledge to unravel Biden’s climate gains should he retake the White House is enough to drive environmentally minded voters to the polls for Harris.

Harris’ entry into the race has further stoked excitement among the green base, something Biden had struggled to do — and climate activists say they’re avoiding doing anything that might spoil that momentum. “We don't want to sabotage her campaign for no valid reason,” Brett Hartl, the chief political strategist with the Center for Biological Diversity Action Fund, told Zack Colman.

Plus, avoiding the subject may woo voters in the natural gas-laden swing state of Pennsylvania concerned that Harris once promised to ban fracking before reversing herself. (Trump’s campaign is trying hard to remind those voters, however.)

While green groups have largely given Harris a grace period, eventually more activists are going to demand specifics.

“We need more than platitudes,” Collin Rees, political director at Oil Change U.S., said in a statement. “We need concrete, specific commitments to match the urgency of the climate crisis.”

Democrats say the Biden administration’s policies, if not unraveled, will create hundreds of thousands of jobs, remake the economy, lower consumers' costs and help save the planet from climate change. But many analyses show the measures won’t fully realize the nation’s climate goals.

So the actions Harris eventually proposes for slashing the country’s remaining atmospheric pollution will matter if the country is to succeed in curbing planet-warming emissions 50 percent below 2005 levels by 2030 — the goal laid out in the Paris climate accords.

Still, activists say Harris’ policies won’t matter if she doesn’t win.

“Let’s be clear: the most important climate policy right now is defeating Donald Trump in November,” said Cassidy DiPaola with Fossil Free Media in a statement.

“All the wonky policy details in the world won’t matter if climate deniers control the White House,” she continued.

 

Thank goodness it's Friday — thank you for tuning in to POLITICO's Power Switch. I'm your host, Arianna Skibell. Power Switch is brought to you by the journalists behind E&E News and POLITICO Energy. Send your tips, comments, questions to askibell@eenews.net.

Programming note: This newsletter will be off starting on Monday through Labor Day. We’ll be back in your inbox on Tuesday, Sept. 3.

 

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Today in POLITICO Energy’s podcast: Emma Dumain breaks down why fossil fuel leaders say there are reasons to feel optimistic about Harris' rise even amid Democrats' hostility to the industry.

Power Centers

Photo collage of Linda McMahon, Rick Perry and David Bernhardt

Illustration by Claudine Hellmuth/POLITICO (source images via Getty)

Trump world's other think tank
Project 2025, the policy blueprint from the conservative Heritage Foundation, has drawn significant attention from the media and from Democrats on the campaign trail, write Scott Waldman and Robin Bravender.

But another conservative think tank, the America First Policy Institute, is packed with Trump 1.0 alumni and has a policy agenda of its own that could have even more sway over a second incarnation.

DNC recap: What we learned about climate messaging
For some lawmakers and advocates, the question of how to build an army of climate voters to elect Harris the next president of the United States was a significant preoccupation throughout the last four days, writes Emma Dumain.

While several side events hosted panels devoted to unpacking polling about voter behavior and effective climate messaging, what landed on the main stage left many unsatisfied.

Hungary offers Russian oil loophole
A tense standoff over Hungary's continued imports of Russian oil could be resolved by simply rebranding the barrels, Budapest said Thursday, imploring Ukraine to endorse the solution, write Gabriel Gavin and Victor Jack.

Hungarian officials are arguing that crude shipped by a Russian firm through Ukraine could be officially sold to a Hungarian energy giant before crossing the border. The swap would allow the oil to evade Kyiv's new sanctions.

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China slashed permits for coal-fired power plants by roughly 80 percent in the first half of 2024 amid a construction boom in the country's clean energy sector.

Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration is hedging its bets on how California cooperates with the federal government on water ahead of a potential second Trump term.

That's it for today, folks. Thanks for reading, and have a great weekend!

 

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