"Swift action to confront
the climate emergency has to start the moment the next president enters the
Oval Office."
Monday, December 09, 2019
Over 500 groups on Monday
rolled out an an action plan for the next president's first days of office to
address the climate emergency and set the nation on a transformative path
towards zero emissions and a just transition in their first days in office.
"Swift action to confront
the climate emergency has to start the moment the next president enters the
Oval Office," said attorney Kassie Siegel, director of the Center for
Biological Diversity's Climate Law Institute.
The set of 10
actions, which together "form the necessary foundation for the
country's true transformation to a safer, healthier, and more equitable world
for everyone," are featured on the new Climate President website. The
actions—which "touch the lives of every person living in America and those
beyond who are harmed by the climate crisis"—can all be taken by the
president without Congressional, thus can, and should, happen immediately,
the document argues.
The new effort is convened by
advocacy groups representing a range of issues, including the Center for
Biological Diversity, Climate Justice Alliance, Democracy Collaborative, and
Labor Network for Sustainability. Other backers include Physicians for Social
Responsibility, the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy, and Dēmos.
The groups' roadmap kicks
off with a demand for the next president to declare a national climate
emergency under the National Emergencies Act. It includes a demand to direct
"relevant federal agencies to reverse all Trump administration executive
climate rollbacks and replace with sufficiently strong action."
Asserting authority the
National Emergencies Act, Siegel and Center for Biological Diversity energy
director Jean Su wrote in a legal analysis supporting the action plan, is
necessary in order for the next president to reinstate the crude oil export ban
and redirect "military spending towards the construction of clean
renewable energy projects and infrastructure."
Declaring a climate emergency,
the analysis adds, would also "set the appropriate tone of
urgency for climate action."
The other nine steps for the
nation's next leader to take within their first 10 days of office are, as noted
in the document:
Keep fossil fuels in the
ground.
Stop fossil fuel exports and
infrastructure approval.
Shift financial flows from
fossil fuels to climate solutions.
Use the Clean Air Act to set a
science- based national pollution cap for greenhouse pollutants.
Power the electricity sector
with 100% clean and renew-able energy by 2030 and promote energy democracy.
Launch a just transition to
protect our communities, workers, and economy.
Advance Climate Justice:
Direct federal agencies to assess and mitigate environmental harms to
disproportionately impacted Indigenous Peoples, People and Communities of
Color, and low-wealth communities.
Make polluters pay:
Investigate and prosecute fossil fuel polluters for the damages they have
caused. Commit to veto all legislation that grants legal immunity for
polluters, undermines existing environmental laws, or advances false solutions.
Rejoin the Paris Agreement and
lead with science-based commitments that ensure that the United States, as the
world’s largest cumulative historical emitter, contributes its fair share and
advances climate justice.
As part of this overall
undertaking, groups say,
the next president must
prioritize support for communities that historically have been harmed first and
most by the extractive economy, including communities of color, Indigenous
communities, and low-wealth communities. The next President must also take
special care to ensure that the rights of Indigenous Peoples are upheld, which
includes following the Indigenous Principles of Just Transition.
Moreover, climate policies
must drive job growth and spur a new green economy that is designed and built
by communities and workers and that provides union jobs with family-sustaining
wages. These policies must ensure that workers in the energy sector and related
industries, whose jobs will be fundamentally transformed, are not abandoned.
According to Anthony
Rogers-Wright, policy coordinator for Climate Justice Alliance, "This set
of executive actions puts the fossil fuel, and other iniquitous industries that
treat our communities like sacrifice zones, on notice, while offering a suite
of actions the next president can promulgate on day one to address systemic and
institutionalized injustices. At the same time, we're also putting the next
Congress on notice to get serious about dismantling this crisis, or the people
will circumvent you with all available means."
In addition to executing the
10 steps, the Climate President action plan urges the next president to
further tackle the crisis by working with Congress as well as state and local
governments on appropriate plans. Those efforts must include working to pass
the Green New Deal.
While the Trump administration
has taken a sledgehammer to environmental protections, previous administrations
also hold blame for failing to sufficiently act on the climate, said Sriram
Madhusoodanan, climate campaign director of Corporate Accountability.
"The United States
government has long acted to advance the interests of corporations over people,
and under Trump the government has lowered the bar even further," he said.
"The U.S. continues to act at the behest of big polluters like the fossil
fuel industry by ignoring science, blocking climate policy, and putting big
polluter profit over the needs and demands of people."
"The next
administration," added Madhusoodanan, "must start a new chapter in
U.S. history, kick polluters out of climate policy-making, make them pay for
the damage they’ve knowingly caused, and take every action possible to advance
urgently needed, internationally just climate action."
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