Brown won’t back ‘Green New Deal’ yet
But he stopped short of endorsing recent proposals.
Ohio Democrat Sherrod Brown defends progressive credentials while not fully embracing the most liberal ideas put forth.
As he conWASHINGTON — siders a bid for the White House, Sen. Sherrod Brown is stopping short of endorsing ambitious, sometimes costly progressive proposals to provide Medicare for all and eliminate carbon emissions entirely.
Instead, in an hour–long breakfast with reporters sponsored by the Christian Science Monitor on Tuesday, the Ohio Democrat defended his progressive credentials while not fully embracing the most liberal ideas to come out of the new Democratic House Majority and Democratic presidential candidates such as Sen. Elizabeth Warren.
“I’m not going to take a position on every bill that’s coming out,” he said, while saying he nonetheless considers climate change “one of the most important moral issues of our time.” He said he supports universal coverage but endorses allowing people to buy-in to Medicare at the age of 50 and possi- bly expanding it from there.
“I think over time people will see how well this works,” he said, saying doing so is “not just practical and smart, it will help people today.”
By not fully embracing some of the most ambitious proposals in his party — he also declined to endorse Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s call for a 70 percent marginal tax rate for the wealthiest Americans — Brown is back- ing up arguments that he’s made that he may be able to win industrial Midwest- ern states that have been loath to elect Democrats in recent years. Brown was the only Democrat to win statewide in Ohio last fall, win- ning with 53.4 percent of the vote.
David Cohen, a political sc ience professor at the University of Akron said while Brown is sympa- thetic to issues such as universal health care and climate change, he won’t nec- essarily sign onto every bill addressing the issues.
“This guy’s been in politics his entire adult life,” he said. “He’s a policy wonk, he understands the legislative process, and he under- stands what is practical and pragmatic and what can be accomplished versus a lot of pie in the sky proposals.”
Pressed in particular about whether he embraced a “Green New Deal” proposed by Ocasio–Cortez, Brown said “I’m not going to get in the position of every time some- body has a really good idea or a big idea that I have to talk in great detail about my position on it.”
“I know that the easy thing to do is say, ‘yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. But I don’t know that it serves my constituents.”
At the same time, Brown emphasized his progressive credentials, saying if he runs, “I will be the only Democrat on that stage who voted against the Iraq War. I’ll be the only Democrat on that stage who’s supported marriage equality for 20 years. I’ll be the only Democrat on that stage that opposed NAFTA. I’ll be the only per- son on that stage that has a long lifetime record of an F from the NRA so I don’t need to cosponsor every bill that others think they need to cosponsor to show my progressive politics.”