House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) on Wednesday mocked the “New Green Deal” just hours before its outline was unveiled — the latest example of the Democrat Party’s widening split between establishment lawmakers and its progressive wing on how to tackle “climate change.”
Democrats including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) are calling for a Green New Deal intended to transform the United States economy to combat climate change and create thousands of jobs in renewable energy.
The freshman lawmaker and Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA) are teaming up on the plan, which aims to eliminate all carbon emissions in U.S. energy production by 2030. A joint resolution drafted by Ocasio-Cortez and Markey sets a goal to meet “100 percent of the power demand in the United States through clean, renewable and zero-emission energy sources,” including dramatic increases in wind and solar power.
In an interview with Politico, Pelosi said that while she is moving forward with plans to create a climate change panel, a suggestion to use it to write legislation for the “Green New Deal” is not in the cards. “It will be one of several or maybe many suggestions that we receive,” Pelosi told Politico. “The green dream or whatever they call it, nobody knows what it is, but they’re for it, right?”
On Thursday, Pelosi released a list of several members named to the select committee, which — most notably — did not include Ocasio-Cortez.
NEW: Speaker Nancy Pelosi names members to new Select Committee on the Climate Crisis.
“The American people have spoken, and demanded bold action to take on the climate crisis, which is the existential threat of our time,” she says. https://t.co/RIKRdHdvEX pic.twitter.com/8SvBeHRn1C
— ABC News (@ABC) February 7, 2019
Despite a cold reception from top Congressional Democrats, several Democrat presidential hopefuls have embraced the idea of a “Green New Deal” without saying exactly what it means.
Ocasio-Cortez said in a statement that the plan will create “unprecedented levels of prosperity and wealth for all while ensuring economic and environmental justice and security.” She calls for a “World War II-scale mobilization” that includes high-quality education and health care, clean air and water and safe, affordable housing.
The resolution does not include a price tag, but some Republicans predict it would cost in the trillions of dollars. They denounced the plan at House hearings on climate change on Wednesday.
The Green New Deal would be paid for “the same way we paid for the original New Deal, World War II, the bank bailouts, tax cuts for the rich and decades of war — with public money appropriated by Congress,” Ocasio-Cortez claimed.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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