August 19, 2024
Several organizations focused on combating climate change joined forces on Monday, August 19, for a $55 million advertising campaign in support of Vice President Kamala Harris—embracing what they describe as the economic upside of the Democratic Party’s environmental efforts, reports The New York Times.
The campaign will include ads in at least six swing states: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. It is being run by the L.C.V. Victory Fund, a political arm of the League of Conservation Voters; E.D.F. Action Votes, an affiliate of the Environmental Defense Fund; Climate Power Action, a communications organization; and Future Forward, one of the biggest super PACs in Democratic politics.
“When the choice is so stark between Vice President Harris and Trump, and we know it’s going to be a close election, there was a recognition that we needed to join forces,” Pete Maysmith, the senior vice president of Campaigns at the League of Conservation Voters, said in an interview. The coalition, he said, “could put more dollars together jointly to communicate why this is such an important decision from a climate and energy perspective.”
Three of the ads—shared with The New York Times before their release—frame President Joe Biden’s climate policies and Harris’s prospective policies in terms of economic benefits rather than environmental ones, and also touch on economic issues not directly related to the climate.
“The goal of her presidency: strengthen America’s middle class,” the first ad says. “We get there by investing in growing fields like advanced manufacturing and clean energy—good-paying jobs that don’t need a four-year degree. Cap the price of drugs and strengthen Social Security.”
Th second ad focuses on Harris’s time as San Francisco district attorney and California attorney general—noting that she led cases against oil companies whose operations polluted communities and against banks that foreclosed on homeowners. “Harris took on the most powerful interests, while Donald Trump has always stood with corporations that rip us off, and he always will,” it says.
The third says Harris knows prices are too high, so she will “triple America’s clean energy production”—saving families money, it says—and “take on big oil companies’ price gouging.”
The messaging is in line with that of the Biden-Harris Administration. Biden enacted the country’s largest investment in climate-change mitigation by signing the Inflation Reduction Act, but he and Harris have often promoted it primarily as a force that is benefiting working-class Americans by pushing companies to create manufacturing and construction jobs for green-energy projects.
“Kamala Harris’s vision is focused on helping working families, from lowering energy bills to creating new jobs in growing industries like clean energy,” Chauncey McLean, the president of the Future Forward PAC, said in a statement. “Donald Trump is focused on helping wealthy corporations like big oil companies make more money.”
Harris’s and Trump’s platforms on climate and environmental issues are starkly different. Ms. Harris supports efforts to increase renewable energy use and lower carbon emissions through tax incentives and federal regulations, while Mr. Trump wants to undo many regulations and has mocked both renewable energy and the facts of climate change.
While polls show that many voters are worried about climate change, they generally rank the economy higher on their list of concerns. Maysmith said he believed a message connecting the two would resonate.
“Clean energy is cheaper energy,” he said. “If she’s looking at how can things be more affordable for voters, this is one way to do that.”
Research contact: @nytimes
