Missing the Big Picture: Climate Change Neglected in 2024 Presidential Campaign
Analysts stated that climate change is a major issue for voters that Vice President Kamala Harris needs to court but the topic only came up rarely in the lead-up to the presidential election. Despite the fact that the risks couldn’t be more powerful for the planet that is becoming more and more threatened by global warming.
The Democratic platform calls for immediate action to defend Americans’ lives and futures and acknowledges climate change as a global emergency. However, the Harris campaign’s main concerns were the economy, abortion rights and democratic dangers; environment was only mentioned in passing. That held true even after major swing states were hit by Hurricanes Helene and Milton, which experts argued were made more intense by climate change.
In the meantime the former President Donald Trump pledged to increase the production of oil and gas which he referred to as the “liquid gold under our feet” by withdrawing the United States from the Paris Climate Agreement and continuing to eliminate dozens of environmental and climate regulations.
Environmental activists strongly endorsed Harris shortly after she entered the campaign in July and some progressive organisations that had turned down President Joe Biden’s support expressed their support for her. However, her campaign was criticised by others for not doing more to address climate change.
The youth-led Sunrise Movement released a dissatisfied statement following the candidate’s September debate in which Harris underlined that she would not outlaw hydraulic fracturing and praised the increasing production of gas and oil under the Biden administration.
Stevie O’Hanlon of the Sunrise Movement stated at the time that Harris “missed a critical opportunity to lay out a stark contrast with Trump and show young voters that she will stand up to Big Oil and stop the climate crisis. Harris spent more time promoting fracking than laying out a bold vision for a clean energy future.”
One of the former Democratic U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer, whom Harris succeeded in 2017, rejected the idea that Harri’s campaign was lacking in its attention to climate change. “Harris has brought it up in practically all of her speeches especially when she speaks to the new voters,” Boxer noted.
One possible explanation is that despite the fact that 62 percent of registered voters would prefer to vote for a candidate for public office who supports action on global warming and climate change was only ranked 19th out of 28 issues as “very important” in a recent survey conducted by Yale and George Mason University.
