The special committee on climate change Democrats plan to have next year is too weak according to Rep.-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y.
In a flurry of tweets on New Year’s Eve, Ocasio-Cortez said she approved of the committee’s establishment, but lamented how fellow Democrats deemed three proposals she championed for a “New Green Deal Committee” to be “too controversial.”
“It had 3 simple elements: 1. No fossil fuel money on climate cmte 2. Offer solutions for impacted communities 3. Draft sample,” Ocasio-Cortez tweeted.
“In DC + even in our own party, it‘s apparently too controversial to ask that we keep oil+gas co’s away from enviro policy,” she continued. “It’s too controversial to talk about the socioeconomics of Flint, WV, PR & the Bronx. It’s too controversial to plan for disasters that are already here.”
House Speaker-designate Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., announced on Friday that Rep. Kathy Castor, D-Fla., would chair the Select Committee on the Climate Crisis in the next term. In a follow-up note to colleagues, she said the panel’s focus would be to “engage the American people on the urgency of the climate crisis on public health, on reducing air pollution, on the economy for America to be preeminent in green technologies, on national security to facing climate-driven conflict and instability, and on our sacred moral responsibility to protect God’s creation for our children.”
However, Democrats like Ocasio-Cortez, who made climate change a priority in their midterm campaigns, have expressed frustrations that the panel appears to have less power than its 2007 predecessor. By all appearances the panel will not have subpoena power and Castor recently told E&E News that lawmakers who have received donations from the fossil fuel industry won’t be barred from joining. “I don’t think you can do that under the First Amendment, really,” she said.
“While I applaud the establishment of the Select Committee, without subpoena power or the reasonable requests stated, it will be in an even weaker position than the select climate committee of 10 years ago,” Ocasio-Cortez said Monday. “There is still time to strengthen it. For all our sake, I hope that we do.”
