On the five-year anniversary of the Green New Deal, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) praised her resolution’s ability to spark worldwide climate change policies and green energy projects, despite not passing the deal through Congress.
Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA), along with several other Democrats and climate activists, joined Ocasio-Cortez outside the Capitol on Thursday to celebrate the resolution’s anniversary and celebrate a report highlighting their achievements and future green energy goals.
“What an incredible, amazing day,” Ocasio-Cortez said to the crowd via Fox News. “Five years ago, we introduced a 10-year vision for social and ecological transformation big enough to save our planet. The Green New Deal.”
“When we unveiled the Green New Deal, the critics jumped against it nearly immediately,” the New York representative continued. “They said it was an impossible dream, too impractical, and not serious enough, and today, we can say that they were wrong. In the last five years, we have made major strides in tackling the climate crisis and creating millions of jobs by building together a diverse coalition of people committed to a better future.”
Ocasio-Cortez said the Green New Deal sparked the idea for and led to the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act, a massive climate bill signed by President Joe Biden in August 2022 that funnels billions into green energy programs. She said her green energy resolution “paved the way for that to get done” and urged activists that they “should not settle for anything less than transforming our society and economy.”
The Green New Deal was subject to intense scrutiny from Republicans and some centrist Democrats who thought the resolution was irresponsible spending that would burden taxpayers.
A book focusing on Ocasio-Cortez’s relationships with her fellow House Democrats released in December claimed the Green New Deal failed because “overconfidence had crept in” among the New York Democrat and her followers. Evan Weber, co-founder of the Sunrise Movement, which worked with Ocasio-Cortez on the Green New Deal, told the book’s author that the plan was “haphazardly” put together and came out with several mistakes.
However, the report released on Thursday, called “Five Years of the Green New Deal,” outlines several state and federal climate-related achievements and details the shift in public opinion, with the public believing more in the effects of global warming. Some of the achievements included coal power production decreasing while renewable energy increased. The report notes that Biden’s goal to electrify power and transportation areas resembles road maps detailed in the Green New Deal.
“These key elements of a Green New Deal future cannot be left behind or forgotten,” the report concludes. “In the next five years, the Green New Deal movement will continue to fight for intersectional victories.”
Markey, who is the chairman of the Senate Climate Task Force, said during Thursday’s event that the American Rescue Plan and Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, two billion-dollar packages that included green energy investments, were birthed out of the Green New Deal, as well.
“We have to take even more ambitious steps forward towards rebuilding our public services, towards supporting union and clean economy workers, towards phasing out fossil fuels, towards holding Big Oil, Big Gas accountable for what they have done,” Markey said. “But if the past five years have taught us anything, it is that we will do it. We will win, and we will do it together.”
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“That is what we’re celebrating today, the progress that we’ve made, but also the commitment that we’re making to an even better future as we fight together to secure that future,” he added.
The Green New Deal was first introduced by Ocasio-Cortez and Markey in February 2019 amid a rise in calls from climate activists and environmental groups asking for Congress to limit carbon emissions. The resolution, which is just 14 pages, would call for the end of fossil fuel extraction and call for redirecting massive investments into alternative energy sources. It is estimated to cost as little as $52 trillion and upwards of $92.9 trillion, according to an analysis from the American Action Forum.
