Biden’s tepid climate moves
President Joe Biden is announcing executive actions to tackle climate change, but his moves are unlikely to appease liberals who are pushing for him to declare an “emergency.”
BIDEN GOES SOLO ON CLIMATE: President Joe Biden is planning to announce executive actions to combat climate change Wednesday, but he’s expected to stop short of declaring a national emergency that would unlock new tools for driving down emissions.
Biden will deliver remarks at a shuttered power plant in Massachusetts that is now being developed to launch the nascent offshore wind industry, in a presentation that represents more show than substance.
Biden’s trip is designed to rally the Democratic base after the collapse of negotiations aimed at getting a party-line climate bill through Congress via the budget reconciliation process. But the president's tepid moves are unlikely to satisfy progressives.
The actions to be announced Wednesday include the awarding of funds through a Federal Emergency Management Agency program that helps communities bolster their defenses against the effects of climate change, new guidance for the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program that supports energy efficiency upgrades and still unknown efforts to spur offshore wind development, a White House official told reporters.
“It’s disappointing. It’s a mistake to not declare a climate emergency,” Rep. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.) told ME. “There are several things emergency authorities would unlock and put on the table.”
Lawmakers told POLITICO Tuesday that the White House had informed them it was considering the emergency declaration, though it had not yet decided whether to take the step.
That hesitancy reflects how opening up the climate emergency box could create an air of expectation that the administration would actually follow through with dramatic actions such as halting oil and gas development on federal land, using the Defense Production Act to turbocharge clean power development and issuing stringent greenhouse gas and pollution limits.
“What happens if you make that declaration is it ups the ante because it gives him the capacity for example, under the National Emergency Act, he could reinstate the ban on crude oil exports, he could suspend offshore fossil fuel leases, halt billions of dollars of investments and fossil fuel projects abroad,” said Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Oreg.), who supports POTUS declaring a climate emergency. “And if he does this, there's the expectation and pressure for him to go ahead and do it. So I can understand people wanting to be very deliberate and not raise expectations.”
Any move to restrict fossil fuels, in particular, faces certain opposition from Republicans warning against any constraints on fuel supplies during a time of high inflation.
“A radical climate emergency declaration would just add fuel to the fire of inflation,” Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) told ME.
Keeping legislative hopes alive: By holding its fire and keeping its options open, the Biden administration may also be trying to maintain the long-shot prospect that it can reach a deal with holdout vote Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia to pass climate legislation via reconciliation.
But Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer confirmed Wednesday that Democrats are moving forward with a health care-centric budget bill that leaves out massive clean energy tax credits, as most of the party is tired of waiting for Manchin to commit, POLITICO’s Marianne Levine and Burgess Everett reported.
Schumer did dangle the possibility the party could pursue a second reconciliation bill later this year, potentially focused on climate, an idea at least some Democrats are holding out hope for.
“Let's wait and see whether there really is an absence [of climate action] in Congress,” Sen. John Hickenlooper (D-Colo.) told POLITICO’s Kelsey Tamborrino. “Joe Manchin is still at the table, I’m at the table. We should all be at the table.”
Hickenlooper, who engaged in a lengthy conversation with Manchin witnessed by your host and Kelsey on Tuesday afternoon, later took to Twitter to declare “we're much closer to a climate deal than people realize. Let's not throw in the towel just yet.”
By: Josh Siegel
Source: Politico Pro
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