Debate shows GOP candidates still struggle to address climate change
The eight Republican presidential candidates on the debate stage Wednesday were asked to raise their hands if they believed human behavior is causing climate change. Not a single hand went up. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis shut down the question and attacked the “corporate media.” Echoing the words of former President Donald Trump, Vivek Ramaswamy called climate change “a hoax” and a “wet blanket on our economy.” Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., insisted that more serious environmental threats are coming from China, India and Africa.
Just one Republican, former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, said climate change “is real.”
A day later, frustrated leaders in the GOP’s small but growing movement of environmental activists said their party must do better. Some young conservatives confronted Ramaswamy at a gathering after the debate and told him his answer was particularly unhelpful.
“We’re getting to a point where Republicans are losing winnable elections because they’re alienating people that care about climate change,” Christopher Barnard, the Republican president of the American Conservation Coalition, said Thursday.
As the 2024 presidential contest begins in earnest, the Republican Party is struggling to reconcile rising concerns about climate change — especially young people — with the GOP’s older base, which largely rejects climate science as a liberal conspiracy theory. Scientists overwhelmingly agree that heat-trapping gases released from the combustion of fossil fuels are pushing up global temperatures, upending weather patterns and endangering animal species.
Some GOP leaders have acknowledged they cannot ignore climate change altogether. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., has called for planting 1 trillion trees to help protect the environment.
“The climate change agenda is a hoax,” Ramaswamy said during the debate, repeating the line for emphasis, even as some younger people in the audience booed. “The reality is more people are dying of climate change policies than they actually are of climate change.”
None of Ramaswamy’s competitors challenged him directly on climate, even after the debate moderators highlighted new evidence that climate change is causing major problems.
Former Vice President Mike Pence, who was silent on climate change during the debate, suggested Thursday it is largely a matter of messaging for the GOP.
“Look, the climate is changing, but I believe the issue is what we do about it,” Pence told The Associated Press, condemning Democratic-backed policies such as the so-called Green New Deal. “It’s all just about communicating a different vision.”