One word that should have been uttered quite a bit during last week’s Democratic National Convention — “climate,” a top issue for much of the party’s base — was pretty much missing in action.
If you’re wondering why, there’s a one-word answer: Pennsylvania.
“I think they are worried if [Kamala Harris] takes a strong position on climate, even it fits the same position that Biden took, it will make her look too progressive,” Kevin Book, managing director of Clearview Energy Partners, told reporters.
“It’s a divisive issue and they need both sides as much as possible to win Pennsylvania.”
For Democrats, talking about climate and its flip-side issue, fracking, is a lose-lose proposition just now.
If Harris pushes anti-carbon policies, she might lose Pennsylvania.
If she supports fracking, she risks alienating young climate voters.
But Pennsylvania is clearly the more important prize.
Between Harris’ 2019 campaign statement that she favored a ban on fracking and the Biden-Harris administration’s ongoing war against fossil fuels, Pennsylvanians and many others are justifiably worried that a Harris presidency would pick up where Biden’s left off, working to destroy the American oil and gas industry.
Fracking is very profitable — and therefore very popular — in Pennsylvania. In 2022, the industry employed 121,000 Pennsylvanians with an average salary of $97,000, according to FTI Consulting.
Fracking also generated $3.2 billion in state and local tax revenue, and more than $6 billion in royalty payments to landowners that year.
Talk of banning fracking would go over like a lead balloon in Pennsylvania — and Harris has likely already unsettled Keystone State nerves by picking fellow anti-fracker Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz over pro-fracking Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro as a running mate.
A Harris spokesman has indicated that she no longer supports a fracking ban.
But since no statement has come directly from her, it hasn’t convinced anyone.
It’s unusual that climate was not mentioned in any significant way at the convention — and that climate activists aren’t gluing themselves to anything in protest.
And the normally climate-hysteric mainstream media also isn’t pressing the issue with its usual fervor. Imagine the predicament if Harris were asked to comment.
There’s an answer to that conundrum as well.
“I am not concerned,” said Jay Inslee, the Democratic governor of Washington, who made climate change the centerpiece of his own failed 2019 bid for the presidency.
Inslee last week told reporters it’s more important for Harris to distinguish herself from former President Donald Trump than to drill down on “policy nitty-gritty.”
The money quote from Inslee: “I am totally confident that when she is in a position to effect positive change, she will.”
So that’s it right there.
Democrats, without having to say a word, know what Harris, a Senate co-sponsor of the Green New Deal, will do on climate if she wins.
She will continue press the war against fossil fuels, including working to ban fracking.
At a little-covered meeting of the Democratic National Convention’s Environmental and Climate Crisis Council, Harris climate adviser Ike Irby said the candidate has pledged to take “bold action” on climate, and is “fully committed” to building on what the Biden-Harris administration has already accomplished.
The goal for Democrats, then, is just to get her elected — and the odds of a Harris victory are better if she keeps mum on climate and fracking.
Eager for their share of the $1.2 trillion of climate spending in the Inflation Reduction Act, the climate industry is betting on Harris as well.
She expects to raise $5 million from climate tech venture capitalists at a fundraiser during Climate Week NYC in September. Climate advocacy groups are launching a $55 million ad campaign for Harris.
So even though she’s not talking about climate, the climate industry is talking about her.
Will her strategy work?
Keep in mind a July 2022 poll ahead of that year’s midterm elections reported that only 1% of likely voters said climate was a top priority.
It’s a topic, as Democrat pollster David Schor said in 2021, that appeals to “weird, very liberal white” people.
But while weird white leftists are an important Harris constituency, there are not likely enough of them to win Pennsylvania — or the election.
Steve Milloy is a senior legal fellow with the Energy and Environmental Legal Institute and is on X at @JunkScience.
