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green new deal network
Over 650 Progressive Groups Vow to Fight 'Dirty' Manchin Deal 'With Everything We've Got'
Broad coalition calls on Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi to "stand with the communities who continue to bear the brunt of harm from fossil fuels and act to prevent wholesale climate disaster."
Aug 24, 2022
A broad coalition of more than 650 climate and progressive advocacy groups Wednesday called on congressional Democratic leaders to reject Sen. Joe Manchin's "alarming" demands for U.S. fossil fuel projects contained in a "dirty" side deal that the West Virginia Democrat secretly negotiated to gain his support for his own party's historic but watered-down package on climate, taxes, and drug price reforms.
"After the IRA paved the way for another decade of fracking and pipelines, we have no choice but to fight this dirty deal with everything we've got."
"We are writing to express our strenuous opposition to any additional fossil fuel giveaways," states the coalition's letter to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), noting that the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) signed by President Joe Biden last week "already included large giveaways to polluters."
"We call on you to unequivocally reject any effort to promote fossil fuels, advance unproven technologies, and weaken our core environmental laws," the letter adds. "You must stand with the communities who continue to bear the brunt of harm from fossil fuels and act to prevent wholesale climate disaster."
According to a leaked one-page summary of what critics have called "the ultimate devil's bargain," the proposal would prioritize approval of projects with "strategic national importance," set time restrictions for reviewing permits, alter federal water rules, limit lawsuits, and increase federal authority for certain facilities. Manchin is also pushing for the completion of the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP), a fracked gas project that runs through his home state but is opposed by many of his constituents.
"This fossil fuel wish list is a cruel and direct attack on environmental justice communities and the climate," the new letter argues. "Prolonging the fossil fuel era perpetuates environmental racism, is wildly out of step with climate science, and hamstrings our nation's ability to avert a climate disaster. Supporting this legislation would represent a profound betrayal of frontline communities and constituents across the country who have called on you to prevent the multitude of harms of fossil fuels and advance a just, renewable energy future."
The groups--including the Center for Popular Democracy, Climate Justice Alliance, Green New Deal Network, Indivisible, Oil Change International, MoveOn, NAACP, Oxfam America, People's Action, Public Citizen, Sierra Club, and Sunrise Movement--are demanding "bold congressional action to address the existential threat of climate chaos."
Such action "requires limiting the production of oil, gas, and coal, which are responsible for 85% of greenhouse emissions and are the root driver of the climate crisis," the letter states. "Relying only on large-scale investments in renewable energy and environmental justice alone will not stave off climate disaster if Congress simultaneously puts its legislative foot on the gas to expand fossil fuel production and false solutions like carbon capture, hydrogen, biomass, biofuels, factory farm gas, and nuclear power."
\u201cThe dirty "deal" being forced on us by Manchin + @SenSchumer would fast-track fossil fuel projects and strip away the chance for public input or meaningful environmental review. \n\nTake action with us to demand Congress and @POTUS stop it: https://t.co/czXlPHeGkc \ud83d\udce2\u201d— People vs. Fossil Fuels (@People vs. Fossil Fuels) 1661274000
The letter acknowledges that Manchin wants to tie his dirty deal--which is already facing opposition from some progressives in the House--to legislation to fund the federal government after the end of next month. The right-wing Democrat has even threatened a government shutdown if members of both parties don't back his proposal.
The coalition's letter charges that "tethering this legislation to any must-pass legislation including a continuing resolution to fund the federal government is morally abhorrent. Holding the funding of the entire federal government hostage to satiate one senator with a heavy financial self-interest in fossil fuels is beyond irresponsible."
"Sacrificing the health and prosperity of communities in Appalachia, the Gulf Coast, Alaska, the Midwest, the Southwest, and other frontline communities around the country makes this side-deal profoundly disgraceful," the documents adds. "Our communities and our collective future require the political courage to stop the fossil fuel stranglehold once and for all."
Representatives of groups that signed the letter echoed its urgent tone.
"This dirty side deal is nothing short of a wholesale giveaway to the fossil fuel industry to the detriment of frontline communities, tribal nations, and Mother Earth," said Joye Braun, national pipelines organizer of the Indigenous Environmental Network. "The world is on fire and negotiating the amount of fuel for those flames is not acceptable. Congress needs to understand that there is no compromise when it comes to protecting the next seven generations of life and beyond."
\u201cHere's how you can tell your representatives to stop the fast-tracking of Big Oil deals:\nhttps://t.co/k9dZ2Mp1bL\u201d— Our Revolution (@Our Revolution) 1660854770
According to Brett Hartl, government affairs director at the Center for Biological Diversity, "it's atrocious that Congress is even considering dismantling bedrock environmental protections just to please one senator." He called the effort a "poisonous plan" that "must be stopped."
"The grassroots climate movement is fired up to stop this fossil fuel expansion deal, and the sit-ins at Sen. Schumer and Murray's offices last week are just the beginning."
The letter follows protests against the deal and resulting arrests last week at the offices of both Schumer and Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), the party's third-ranked member in the Senate.
Thomas Meyer, national organizing manager at Food & Water Watch, told Common Dreams that "Manchin and Schumer are in for a rude awakening if they thought they could slip this deal through without a fuss."
"The grassroots climate movement is fired up to stop this fossil fuel expansion deal, and the sit-ins at Sen. Schumer and Murray's offices last week are just the beginning," Meyer added. "After the IRA paved the way for another decade of fracking and pipelines, we have no choice but to fight this dirty deal with everything we've got."
The Stop MVP and People vs. Fossil Fuels coalitions are planning a public demonstration against Manchin's deal in the nation's capital next month. "No Sacrifice Zones: Appalachian Resistance Comes to D.C." is set to kick off at 5:00 pm local time on September 8 at the Robert A. Taft Memorial and Carillon.
\u201cRegister here: https://t.co/pNhgK5Uuu9\u201d— Protect Our Water, Heritage, Rights (@Protect Our Water, Heritage, Rights) 1661199333
"We are done being sacrifice zones, and we must stop this bill and MVP!" organizers said in a statement Tuesday. "We want to build community between intersectional Appalachian resistance organizations and have their voices heard! We must protect bedrock environmental laws and public input. We are in solidarity with all frontlines of the climate crisis."
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) on Tuesday granted MVP's request to extend its certificate of public convenience and necessity by four years--a move that Russell Chisholm of the Protect Our Water, Heritage, Rights (POWHR) Coalition said "emphasizes the brutal length and uncertainty of the project."
"This project should never be built and this decision subjects our communities to prolonged harm," he added. "That's why tens of thousands of people submitted comments to stop FERC from granting this extension. Now we're taking our growing movement to D.C. to demand decision-makers stop MVP and all pro-fossil fuel legislation."
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'It Is a Revolution': Ocasio-Cortez and Markey Reintroduce Green New Deal Resolution
"We are in a civilization-altering moment in our history and it's time for America's political leaders to muster the courage and moral clarity to pass the Green New Deal," said the Sunrise Movement's executive director.
Apr 20, 2021
As part of what they are calling "Green New Deal Week," Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Sen. Ed Markey on Tuesday led the reintroduction of their landmark resolution envisioning a 10-year mobilization that would employ millions of people with well-paying, union jobs repairing U.S. infrastructure, while reducing pollution and tackling the country's intersecting climate, economic, health, and racial justice crises.
"On the eve of Biden's climate summit, this is the bold, transformative climate action we need."
--Natalie Mebane, 350.org
"The Green New Deal isn't just a resolution, it is a revolution," said Markey (D-Mass.), who first unveiled the measure with Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) in February 2019. "In the past two years, the Green New Deal has become the DNA of climate action, and the principles of jobs, justice, and climate action are now widely represented in legislation and state and local actions across the country."
"We can transform our economy and our democracy for all Americans by addressing the generational challenge of climate change," Markey said. "We have the technology to do it. We have the economic imperative. We have the moral obligation. We just need the political will."
The Green New Deal Resolution of 2021 (pdf), partly inspired by Franklin D. Roosevelt's 20th century New Deal programs, declares that "it is the duty of the federal government... to achieve the greenhouse gas and toxic emissions reductions needed to stay under 1.5 degrees Celsius of warming, through a fair and just transition for all communities and workers," referencing the more ambitious target of the 2015 Paris climate agreement.
The resolution calls for building resiliency against climate-related disasters; repairing and upgrading U.S. infrastructure; shifting to 100% renewable energy; prioritizing energy efficiency for new and existing buildings; spurring growth in clean manufacturing; promoting sustainable agriculture practices; and overhauling the country's transportation systems.
It also emphasizes the necessity of mitigating and managing the long-term adverse health, economic, and other effects of pollution and the climate emergency; restoring natural ecosystems; cleaning up hazardous waste sites; and "promoting the international exchange of technology, expertise, products, funding, and services, with the aim of making the United States the international leader on climate action."
\u201cToday, we reintroduced The Green New Deal with @SenMarkey - a jobs program that will leave our country more unionized & more just.\n\nWe refuse to leave any community behind. And, those who have been left behind come first.\u201d— Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez) 1618935375
The lead sponsors held an event on Capitol Hill to unveil the resolution, which has gained over a dozen new co-sponsors and is endorsed by over two dozen advocacy groups, including 350.org, Climate Justice Alliance, Future Coalition, Green New Deal Network, Greenpeace USA, Indivisible, Justice Democrats, National Domestic Workers Alliance, NDN Collective, Sierra Club, Sunrise Movement, United We Dream, and Working Families Party.
Two years after the first resolution, "we are still facing the ticking time bomb of the climate crisis, but now alongside the highest levels of joblessness since the Great Depression," noted Sunrise Movement executive director Varshini Prakash. "We are in a civilization-altering moment in our history and it's time for America's political leaders to muster the courage and moral clarity to pass the Green New Deal, launching America's biggest job creation program in a century while combating climate change."
"At a crucial moment like this," she added, "politicians have a choice to make: they can heed the call demanded by science and justice to build back better through a Green New Deal, or they can cower to the fossil fuel industry and force us down a path of destruction, towards the fires that burned our homes to rubble and the floods that took our family and friends with them."
350.org policy director Natalie Mebane pointed out the reintroduction comes just before President Joe Biden's Leaders Summit on Climate, which kicks off Thursday.
"Today, our movement presented a vision for our future: one that staves off the worst of the climate crisis and centers communities in a just transition to a regenerative, people-centered economy," Mebane said. "On the eve of Biden's climate summit, this is the bold, transformative climate action we need. We are calling on Congress and the Biden administration to implement the Green New Deal, ensure a just recovery from the racial, health, climate, and economic crises, and #BuildBackFossilFree."
\u201cShow us what democracy looks like\u201d— Green New Deal Network (@Green New Deal Network) 1618935152
Applauding the resolution "for its vision, intention, and scope," the Indigenous Environmental Network (IEN) said in a statement that "as Indigenous peoples and tribal nations living on the frontline of climate chaos, our communities already experience the direct impacts of climate change--and the various policies that legislate our sovereignty, our lands, and our bodies."
"We know we need bold solutions that meet the scale of our intersecting problems," IEN said. "While it is true their resolution helps shift the national conversation around addressing the climate crisis, they are also helping to shift the national conversation away from the notion that consultation equals consent and toward the codified practice of free, prior, and informed consent with tribal nations and communities. We are encouraged to see congressional leaders take charge to help Indigenous communities and tribal nations protect their homelands, rights, sacred sites, waters, air, and bodies from further destruction."
As Ocasio-Cortez detailed in a statement, "The Green New Deal has three core components: jobs, justice, and climate." She continued:
The dozens of bills that have sprung from this resolution since we introduced it two years ago all contain: 1) a commitment to creating good-paying union jobs; 2) prioritizing frontline and vulnerable communities disproportionately affected by climate change--including communities of color, Indigenous land, deindustrialized communities, and fossil fuel hubs; and 3) reducing greenhouse gas emissions from human sources by 40 to 60% within 10 years and net-zero global emissions by 2050, in line with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's finding that global temperatures must not increase more than 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrialized levels in order to avoid the most severe impacts of climate change.
In a tweet, the congresswoman highlighted the other measures that have been or will be put forth this week--including the Green New Deal for Cities Act of 2021, which she introduced with Rep. Cori Bush (D-Mo.) on Monday. As Common Dreams reported, that bill is a $1 trillion plan to "tackle the environmental injustices that are making us and our children sick, costing us our homes, and destroying our planet."
\u201cIt\u2019s Green New Deal week!\ud83d\udc77\ud83c\udffd\u200d\u2642\ufe0f\ud83c\udf0e\n\nThis week we\u2019re highlighting:\n\u2705 Green New Deal reintro tomorrow w/ new Congressional cosponsors\n\u2705 GND for Cities w/@CoriBush \n\u2705 GND for Public Housing w/@SenSanders\n\u2705 Civilian Climate Corps w/@EdMarkey\n\u2705 Ag Resilience w/@chelliepingree\n\n& more\u201d— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez) 1618878563
Along with reintroducing the original resolution on Tuesday, Ocasio-Cortez and Markey joined with Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and others to introduce the Civilian Climate Corps for Jobs and Justice Act.
The bill would establish a Civilian Climate Corps (CCC) administered by the Corporation for National and Community Service within AmeriCorps. Markey's office framed the proposal as a modern version of a New Deal-era program also known as CCC. The updates include "ensuring that all Americans who want to participate may do so, regardless of race, age, or gender; broadening the range of eligible projects; providing 21st century health and education benefits; deepening partnerships with unions; and preserving tribal sovereignty."
Sanders, who's also a co-sponsor of the initial resolution and the Green New Deal for Public Housing, said in a statement that "the existential threat of climate change is our greatest challenge, but also our greatest opportunity to protect our natural heritage and build a just future for the generations to come."
"In the tradition of FDR's New Deal Civilian Conservation Corps--one of the most successful programs of the era that ensured jobs for millions of working people in maintaining our precious interior and conserving our wilderness--the Civilian Climate Corps for Jobs and Justice Act will create more than a million good-paying jobs, help us protect our natural resources, and move us forward in the fight against climate change," he added. "I am proud to work with my colleagues to see the CCC of our time renewed for the challenges ahead."
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