WASHINGTON – When the Conservative Political Action Conference opens in Dallas Friday, climate change will be far from center stage, with topics such as election fraud and so-called cancel culture dominating the agenda.
While many in the GOP might not consider climate a top priority, the party’s leadership has shown increasing signs of coming around on the need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, said George Behrakis, president of Young Conservatives for Carbon Dividends, which advocates for a tax on carbon emissions and is a sponsor of the CPAC event in Dallas.
“There’s a lot of good momentum in the right direction,” he said. “We’ve seen a number of top Republicans start to acknowledge the issue and realized the party needs to come to the table.”
Late last month, Rep. John Curtis, a Utah Republican, announced the formation of the Conservative Climate Caucus, with more than 60 Republican House members signing on, including Texas congressmen Michael McCaul, Michael Burgess, Michael Cloud, Pat Fallon, August Pfluger and Randy Weber.
The next day, Rep. David McKinley, Republican of Kentucky, and Kurt Schrader, a Democrat from Oregon, revived legislation to boost government spending on clean energy while creating a clean energy standard that would require the power sector to cut greenhouse gas emissions 80 percent by mid-century.
The following week, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, a California Republican, named climate change one of the issues Republicans would tackle through seven Republican policy-specific task forces.
These moves look to position the GOP as climate realists, taking on the crisis but not at the expense of the U.S. economy or energy reliability – a shift away from former president Donald Trump’s skepticism of climate science.
“America’s climate policy should be based on American resources, American innovation, and American competitiveness to reduce global emissions – resulting in lower energy costs, economic growth, and increased security,” said Rep. Garret Graves, the Louisiana Republican leading McCarthy’s Energy, Climate, and Conservation Task Force.
What if any action comes out of these moves remains to be seen.
McKinley and Schrader’s effort to reach across the aisle has drawn support from organizations as diverse as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Wildlife Federation. But the pair failed to get much traction in Congress when they introduced near identical legislation last year. Democrats looked for tougher standards while Republicans were reluctant to institute government mandates.
“I think you could fashion a deal, but that’s still a long ways off,” said Frank Maisano, a Washington communications consultant. “It’s important you have people talking, and this bill is a vehicle for people to talk.”
Driving GOP interest in part are younger members like Behrakis, who graduated from college last year.
A poll last year by the Pew Research Center found that 49 percent of Republicans aged 18 to 39 believed the federal government is not doing enough on climate change, compared to 25 percent of Republicans overall.
“A lot of older Republicans are not as receptive to the climate science,” Behrakis said. “For us, there’s a lot more of a personal stake. In 2050 we’re going to be around when these climate consequences rear their ugly head.”
james.osborne@chron.com
Twitter.com/@osborneja
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