A majority of young Republican voters say they want their GOP members of Congress to work on climate initiatives, according to a recent study by the Climate Leadership Council.
The results revealed that more than 50% of likely Republican voters support a climate agenda, but they want to see GOP lawmakers taking the lead. When broken down by age, more than 70% of younger conservatives voted in support.
But, as CLC CEO Greg Bertelsen pointed out, the context matters.
“We weren’t going to see these results if we asked Republican voters to support the Green New Deal,” Bertelsen told the Washington Examiner.
“But if we’re asking them, ‘Are you supportive of the kinds of policies that Republicans who are stepping into climate are supporting,’ we see a tremendous amount of support,” he said.
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The policies conservatives tend to support are related to leveraging U.S. carbon advantage, domestic production, and “outcompeting China,” Bertelsen added. But the trend shows that voters across the electorate (Republicans, independents, and Democrats) support this strategy.
Nevertheless, there is a “big gap” in terms of how Republicans and Democrats prioritize climate, but the GOP base is no longer rollings its eyes at legislation to combat climate change.
“Republicans who are working on climate today, the ones who are really leading, are in lockstep with where their base voters are,” Bertelsen said on the Plugged In podcast.
“In fact, our analysis showed there’s more terrain that they can cover, they can step out further than they are, and remain in safe territory,” he added.
CLC also assessed how members of the House Conservative Climate Caucus, led by Utah Rep. John Curtis, fared in their primary elections.
They did “very well,” bringing home 62 wins and only five losses — though, Bertelsen said, they were not related to their climate goals.
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Some of those goals aren’t so different from what the Biden administration proposed in the recently signed Inflation Reduction Act, which includes $370 billion in climate spending. That number makes it the largest climate bill in U.S. history.
Bertelsen said the law will “have an impact on everything moving forward.”
“Whether you supported or opposed it, liked parts of it [and] disliked others, it’s hard to argue with the significance of the bill,” he said.
CLC data also show that, by and large, and across industries, the United States is among the cleanest and most carbon-efficient countries in the world.
“That’s a fact that members on both sides of the aisle are increasingly understanding, and it’s a space in which we’re increasingly seeing Republicans gain interest,” Bertelsen said. “We’ve got some right in feeling prideful.”
When asked how optimistic he is when it comes to the future of conservative climate policies, Bertelsen did not hesitate.
“I’m glass all the way full,” he said.
Plugged In, hosted by former Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Chairman Neil Chatterjee and energy reporter Breanne Deppisch, brings on key players, from lawmakers to federal employees to industry experts, to keep our audience up to speed on the latest energy issues facing the country and the planet.
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