Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2017--Motion to Proceed
Floor Speech
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Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I was delighted to let Senator Graham celebrate an achievement by his home State university. I was pleased to yield him the time. Climate Change
Mr. President, I am here, as the Presiding Officer knows, for the 142nd time to urge Congress to wake up to the threat of climate change. We are asleep at the wheel in Congress, heading toward climate catastrophe.
Of course, outside this Chamber there is broad support for responsible climate action from the American people and from every major scientific society. Indeed, 31 of them just sent us a letter this week, reminding us to get off our duffs and pay attention to the science. Virtually every one of our home State universities, our National Laboratories, NASA, NOAA, and the military, national security, and intelligence leadership of our country--if they are all wrong, that is one heck of a hoax.
Frustratingly, Congress is still fogged in by a decades-long, purposeful campaign of deliberate misinformation from the fossil fuel industry and its allies. And since Citizens United, that misinformation campaign is backed up by unprecedented special interest political artillery.
Outside the fossil fuel industry, there is of course broad support for action on climate change across corporate America. Leading businesses and executives vocally supported President Obama on the Paris Agreement. Many are committed to getting onto a sustainable energy path. More than 150 major American firms signed the American Business Act on Climate Pledge. Many are pushing their commitment outside of their corporate walls through their supply chains, but against these Americans corporate efforts on climate stand two major forces that claim to represent American business: the Wall Street Journal editorial page and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
The Wall Street Journal editorial page claims to speak for the business community, small business owners, and industry titans alike, but it is way off base from the business community's commitment to addressing climate change. Its editorial page is constantly wrong about climate change, from misstating the science of climate change, to misstating the costs versus benefits of climate action, to misstating the law when carrying the industry's water to oppose civil investigations into whether the industry climate denial scheme amounts to fraud.
It is not new. The Journal has a well-worn playbook for defending polluting industries. Look at its commentaries over time on acid rain, on the ozone layer, and of course now on climate change. It is always wrong, and worse, there is a pattern, a formula: Deny the science, question the motives of those calling for change, exaggerate the costs of taking action, and, above all, protect the polluting industry.
I have said all of this before, but now there is a study that quantifies it. Climate Nexus's recent analysis of the Wall Street Journal's editorial page shows ``a consistent pattern that overwhelmingly ignores the science, champions doubt and denial of both the science and effectiveness of action, and leaves readers misinformed about the consensus of science and of the risks of the threat.'' The analysis finds the opinion section has ``done its readers a disservice by consistently ignoring or ridiculing the scientific consensus on the reality and urgency of climate change.''
The editorial page's bias, which is out of sync with virtually every single major scientific body, ``cannot help but hinder its readers' ability to make accurate assessments of the risk climate change poses to their businesses.''
Specifically, Climate Nexus's analysis found that of 201 editorials relating to climate science or policy dating back to 1997, not one explicitly acknowledges that fossil fuels cause climate change. Of the 279 op-eds published since 1995, 40 reflect mainstream climate science, a paltry 14 percent. And of 122 columns published since 1997, just 4 accept as fact that fossil fuels cause climate change or endorse a policy to reduce emissions--out of 122 columns, 4. It is laughable.
Between April 2015 and May 2016, when global heat records were falling with regularity, the Journal published 100 climate-related op- eds, columns, and editorials. Only 4 op-eds provided information reflecting mainstream climate science, and 96 pieces in the Journal's opinion section failed to acknowledge the link between human activity and climate change. Even ExxonMobil and Charles Koch admit that link. Last January, for example, the page called recent extreme weather ``business as usual,'' while clinging to the bogus ``hiatus'' argument that global temperature increases had halted.
The Climate Nexus report illuminates a series of advertisements that have been placed--where? On the Wall Street Journal editorial page, calling attention to this preposterous bias.
The first one reads: ``Exxon's CEO Says Fossil Fuels Are Raising Temperatures and Sea Levels. Why won't the Wall Street Journal?'' The copy below goes on to say ExxonMobil has called for a carbon price, and they have.
The CEOs of BP, Shell, Total, Statoil, BG Group and ENI call climate change ``a critical challenge for our world'' and have also called for a price on carbon.
It is time for the editorial board of the WSJ to become part of the solution on climate change.
The next one says: ``Carbon Dioxide Traps Heat on Earth.'' It goes on to say:
This isn't controversial. The head of Exxon Mobil and most major oil companies agree, along with every scientific academy in the world.
Again, a fact.
The next one: ``The Earth Has Warmed. And We Did It.'' It goes on to say:
[W]e've known for more than a century that adding more heat-trapping carbon dioxide to the atmosphere from fossil fuels would warm the planet.
And we have known that. We have known that since Abraham Lincoln was President.
So it's not surprising that the planet keeps getting warmer (although you may not have seen this fact on this page).
And, of course, ``Despite what you may have heard, there has been no `pause.' ''
All of that is solid, clear science.
The next ad: ``What Goes Up Doesn't Come Down. CO
The one that follows: ``Your Assets are at Risk. Beware the Carbon Bubble.''
If you thought the housing bubble and crash of 2008 were bad, consider the carbon bubble: A ticking time-bomb for fossil fuel company investors.
This is why so many conservative economists want to put a ``price'' on carbon to speed the clean energy transition while allowing the markets to cushion and adjust.
Of course that is true. Every single conservative or Republican who has fought the climate change problem through to the solution has come to the same solution, which is a revenue-neutral price on carbon.
Here we go, the most recent ad: ``The Free Market Solution to Climate Change.''
The CEOs of oil giants Exxon, BP, Royal Dutch Shell, Statoil, Total, Eni, and BG Group have all called for carbon pricing. So have the leaders of [many countries around the world].
Wall Street Journal columnist Holman W. Jenkins calls a revenue-neutral carbon tax ``our first-best policy, rewarding innovations by which humans would satisfy their energy needs while releasing less carbon into the atmosphere.''
Those are the advertisements that have been put on the Wall Street Journal editorial page. Unfortunately, it takes people paying for space on the Wall Street Journal editorial page to get the truth about climate change told on the Wall Street Journal editorial page. These are straightforward, broadly accepted statements of the science of climate change.
So if the Wall Street Journal editorial page isn't acknowledging the views of credentialed experts, whom is it representing? Back to the Climate Nexus report, and I quote:
[T]he Wall Street Journal consistently highlights voices of those with vested interests in fossil fuels . . . presenting only the dismissive side of the climate discussion. . . . [T]hat undermines a reader's ability to effectively evaluate climate risk, objectively assess potential solutions, and balance the two.
The report calls the short shrift given to climate change ``a failure ofwall=- journalistic responsibility.'' Look at its commentary on acid rain, on the ozone layer, and on climate change--always the same, always wrong. You have to wonder what service the Wall Street Journal editorial page is providing to its readership, since its record seems to rule out truth or balance or factuality. Maybe the short answer is that the service the Wall Street Journal editorial page is providing isn't a service to its readership.
Let's turn to the other miscreant. You might wonder as well what service the U.S. Chamber of Commerce provides to its members who have responsible climate change policies. The U.S. Chamber is the largest lobbying organization in the country, and its power in Congress is fully dedicated to stopping any serious climate legislation. Everybody here sees the Chamber's hostility to climate legislation everywhere.
My and Senator Warren's offices recently took a look at the lobbying positions of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce compared with the positions of its own board members. With Senators Boxer, Sanders, Brown, Merkley, Blumenthal, and Markey, we released a report on our findings. Not one of the 108 Chamber board members we contacted would endorse the U.S. Chamber's lobbying on climate change--not one. Our investigation found that roughly half of the companies represented on the Chamber's board actually have strong pro-climate action positions, which contrast sharply with the Chamber's lobbying activities.
We also found the Chamber's decisionmaking about these policies to be awfully murky. The Chamber describes its board as its ``principal governing and policymaking body,'' but not one Chamber board member asserted that they were fully aware of and able to provide their input and views to the Chamber regarding its actions on climate. There was no sign of a board vote or any formal input. One company indicated it was ``not advised of any campaigns'' and was ``not aware of any processes'' to lobby against climate action by the Chamber of Commerce. Another company reported that ``the issues raised . . . have not been discussed during the short time [it has] been a member of the organization.''
The Chamber has aggressively lobbied for climate policies that are directly at odds with science, public health, public opinion, and--with the results of this recent research, it turns out--with most of its own board members. Again, the question comes, whom are they serving?
The Center for Responsive Politics--a nonprofit, nonpartisan research group that tracks money spent on elections and lobbying--found that in 2015 alone, the Chamber spent roughly $85 million on lobbying efforts. That is more than twice the amount spent by the second highest lobbying spending organization.
Think for a moment of the progress we could make here if the Chamber's lobbying muscle actually aligned with the positions of the businesses the U.S. Chamber of Commerce purports to represent. We don't see that. Instead, we see the bullying menace of the fossil fuel industry holding sway in these Halls. It appears to have captured the Chamber. It appears to control the Wall Street Journal editorial page.
On the other side, there is virtually zero corporate lobbying effort for a good bipartisan climate bill. The result here is not surprising. Indeed, it is quite predictable when all the artillery is on one side of a fight--all the artillery on the side of the fossil fuel industry. The result is that Members of Congress who know better are afraid to act.
Too many good companies are AWOL on climate change in Congress. Too many have farmed out their lobbying to groups like the Chamber of Commerce that actually oppose their corporate climate policies. Too many will not speak up or answer back when the Wall Street Journal editorial page purports to speak for them but emits only polluter nonsense.
Duty calls. Duty matters. It is time for private sector leaders to step up and tell Congress that those twin appendages of the fossil fuel industry do not represent corporate America on climate change. There is a change that could not come too soon.
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