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A National Emergency is what climate change will be declared as, under Bernie Sander’s proposed “Green New Deal” plan.
Democratic candidate Gov. Jay Inslee of Washington, who has had climate change at the center of his campaign, announced that he was dropping out of the 2020 race. Inslee’s absence creates an opening for another presidential hopeful to pick up his “climate candidate” role, and Bernie Sanders looks like he is ready for the job.
Only one day after Inslee’s announcement, Bernie Sanders is now set to release a $16.3 trillion blueprint to fight climate change. It is the latest and most expensive proposal among the field of Democratic presidential candidates aimed at curtailing global warming.
Sanders was a supporter of the nonbinding congressional plan for tackling global warming that shares the same name, which was introduced by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Sen. Edward J. Markey of Massachusetts.
But Sanders has given the same name, Green New Deal, to his new plan that he is proposing. In it, he opens by stating that the climate crisis is the “single greatest challenge facing our country.” It declares climate change as a national emergency, and calls for the United States to eliminate fossil fuel use by 2050.
With his new plan, Sanders is also wanting to build new wind, solar, and geothermal power sources across the country, which would create jobs. The plan also outlines committing $200 billion to help poor nations combat climate change, as well.
During an interview on Wednesday evening, Sanders claims that his new proposal would create 20 million jobs in the process, and would “pay for itself” over 15 years. It would be funded, in part, by imposing new fees and taxes on the fossil fuel industry.
“President Trump thinks that climate change is a hoax. President Trump is dangerously, dangerously wrong,” Sanders said. “Climate change is an existential threat to the entire country and the entire world and we must be extraordinarily aggressive.”
Democratic voters find the climate crisis increasingly important, and are demanding candidates show that they are prepared to tackle it. A recent survey conducted by Yale University shows that 93 percent of Democratic voters support an aggressive and ambitious plan like the Green New Deal to tackle climate change.
