Inslee discusses climate policy, gun violence
Washington governor and 2020 presidential hopeful Jay Inslee held a brief meet-and-greet Sunday with members of the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada and other interested voters in Las Vegas, where he discussed the recent rash of gun violence in America as well as his calling-card climate policy proposals.
“There was a guy on Fox last night, and he was talking about terrorism, and he was saying, ‘When you see something, say something,’ ” Inslee said. “That was the mantra since 9/11. Well, I see something right now, so I am going to say something: We do not need white nationalism in the White House.”
The comments echoed his statements made during the national debates last week, prior to mass shootings in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio. The El Paso shooting suspect was reportedly targeting “Hispanic invaders” in the shooting that killed 20 people Saturday morning.
Inslee said the White House and the U.S. Senate have failed to “remove weapons of war” from the nation’s streets.
He recalled a vote he made while representing a fairly conservative area of Washington in the U.S.
House of Representatives in 1994 that banned assault weapons under former President Bill Clinton. Inslee said he knew it would cost him his congressional seat, and it did.
“I have never regretted that vote,” Inslee said.
That ban lapsed in 2004, and much of the Democratic party and its overflowing presidential field have called for its immediate reinstatement. A similar ban was passed in the House this year but is unlikely to see a vote in the Senate.
Inslee then shared his usual campaign speech regarding the many reforms passed in his home state — abortion access and reproductive health protections, increased minimum wage, higher teacher salaries, equitable pay for women, net neutrality laws — that he would hope to replicate as president.
He is not just the climate change guy, he joked, but he is putting environmental reforms first because “we won’t have a place to live” if he does not.
Inslee said he has “seen the tears of people whose lives have been affected by climate change,” citing California wildfires, Midwestern floods and rising sea levels in Florida.
Inslee participated in a variety of campaign events in Las Vegas over the weekend, including the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees forum on Saturday. He will host two events in Reno on Monday.