Trump and Vance take aim at Biden’s climate legislation. Some Republicans would rather they didn’t
In nearly every speech, J.D. Vance, the Republican hopeful for U.S. vice-president, drums home that Americans are being duped by the Democrats’ fixation on the low-carbon economy and their wild spending on what Vance calls “green scams.”
“We need a leader … who rejects Joe Biden and Kamala Harris’s green new scam and fights to bring back our great American factories,” he belted out at his nomination speech at the Republican National Convention in July, drawing exuberant cheers.
Vance calls Democrats’ environmental focus “crazy.”
“Kamala Harris cares more about climate change than about inflation,” he wrote in an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal this week.
Vance has also criticized the Democratic vice-presidential candidate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, for supporting “garbage energy” after pledging last year his state would get all its electricity from wind, solar and other carbon-free sources by 2040.
In contrast, Vance and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump are all-in on increasing oil and gas production.
“Unleash American energy! Drill, baby, drill,” Vance has said.
If Trump retakes the White House, he has vowed to repeal the Inflation Reduction Act, a key pillar of Biden’s legacy that promised to inject more than a trillion dollars into green energy investments and incentives alongside bills. About one-third of the money is earmarked for tax breaks for things like clean energy manufacturing, electric vehicles and home upgrades.
Trump has called them “meaningless green new scam ideas,” as he and Vance frame climate spending as a wedge issue in this election campaign, saying it will come at the expense of jobs and Americans’ hard-earned money.
That’s resonating with many voters in Butler County, Ohio — Vance’s base.
“I think it’s a money grab for the politicians. They’re using climate change as a way to put money into certain businesses,” said Jack Ellis, who owns an auto body shop, while enjoying a summer music festival in Butler County earlier this month. “You know, it’s taking money from us. We’re taxpayers.”
For his first campaign stop as VP nominee, Vance chose his hometown of Middletown — a city of about 50,000 people where steel remains critical to its survival.
“Middletown, I love you … and I will never forget where I came from,” he said. He also warned that good factory jobs are at risk with the Democrats’ climate agenda.
“I just want to say to Middletown and a lot of forgotten communities all across our country … they think that we’re backwards…. They think that we don’t know how to do anything,” he said. But “this is where things are made, this is the source of America’s greatness.”
But the Trump-Vance narrative is risky when the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) and other Biden-era bills are projected to create hundreds of thousands of jobs, and much of the green investments are going to Republican districts — including the steel plant in Middletown.
Major decarbonization investment
U.S. Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm has said the IRA and a federal infrastructure law will lead to 33 projects, many in Republican counties, that will collectively get $6 billion in federal funding.
Calling it “the largest single industrial decarbonization investment in American history,” she said these projects “are going to slash our [CO2] emissions by 14 million metric tons per year.”
More than half a billion dollars was allotted to retrofit the Cleveland-Cliffs Middletown Works steel plant, which will help it retire a high-carbon-emitting blast furnace and replace it with two electric ones. The aim is to not only bring down its CO2 emissions, but make it more competitive.
According to the U.S. Energy Department, this process would create 170 new jobs and 1,200 in construction while stabilizing the existing 2,500 jobs at the plant.
When she announced the investment in Middletown this spring, Granholm said “what you do here in Middletown, we will be looking at how we can replicate that in places all across the country.”
Billie Bowermaster, secretary treasurer of the local Laborers International Union, said the Cleveland-Cliffs retrofit is “going to be huge work for this county and for our members.”
“We try to tell them at our union meetings every month where the money’s coming from, who’s on our side, who has our backs. That, you know, the Biden-Harris administration got it done,” Bowermaster said, while acknowledging that at least half of their members back the Republican ticket.
Jeri Lewis, a local resident, says stable industrial jobs are “vital … [and] at the root of who Middletown is,” she said. “It’s important that we grow that industry here, that’s huge for our city.”
Lewis was on the fence about supporting Trump in the election, but she knows the Vance family, and with J.D. on the ticket, she said she’ll vote Republican.
Longtime resident Judy Murray is excited about returning Trump to power, with help from Vance.
“He’s a hometown boy, and I think he’s going to help Trump tremendously. He’s just what we need,” said Murray, 81, as she picked up Trump lawn signs earlier this summer, promising to pass them all out in her Middletown neighbourhood.
Republican pushback
But Trump is facing headwinds over his attacks on climate and infrastructure investments — even from within his own party.
Since the Inflation Reduction Act passed two years ago, 325 new clean energy projects have been announced across the country, according to E2, an environmental research group. Much of the investment has been sprinkled across red and swing states.
WATCH | Vance talks about Biden’s ‘green scams.’ But his hometown got a major climate investment:
The clean energy investments and tax credits are indeed creating jobs. So much so that a group of 18 Republican lawmakers sent a letter to House Speaker Mike Johnson this month asking any future Republican administration not to dismantle all of the Biden-era climate policy, as the funds are reaping political rewards in Republican counties.
“We hear from industry and our constituents who fear the energy tax regime will once again be turned on its head due to Republican repeal efforts,” the letter said. “A full repeal would create a worst-case scenario where we would have spent billions of taxpayer dollars and received next to nothing in return.”
Despite the buy-in from some Republican lawmakers, environmental and climate advocates are worried that Trump’s re-election could imperil the future rollout of green investment. The majority of the promised funds have not yet been invested, and less than 17 per cent of direct investments in climate, energy and infrastructure has been actually spent as of April, according to an analysis in Politico.
Like many other deals, the Cleveland-Cliffs steel plant project is still being negotiated with the U.S. Department of Energy.
“An administration that was intent on rolling back the progress that we have made … could set that back,” says Ted Fertik, vice-president of manufacturing and industrial policy at the BlueGreen Alliance, an organization of unions and environmental groups united to fight climate change.
“We do think there is a lot at stake in this election, and a distinct possibility for some very promising developments to be severely, if not completely reversed,” he said.
Union head sees positive transition
That message is faint, however, as polls consistently show Americans know little about the Inflation Reduction Act and even less about its potential job creation.
Tim Burga, president of the Ohio AFL-CIO union, says the state has a long history of mining coal and making steel. His own grandfather worked in the coal mines.
“There’s a historic connection, there’s an economic connection, with coal and fossil fuels,” he acknowledged, but also said there has to be “a transition into a green energy economy.”
The key is putting workers at the heart of that transition. “It’s got to be a way that takes care of those people and the generations that have given their lives to move America’s economy forward,” Burga said.
“I feel like the policies of the Biden-Harris administration, especially on energy, [are] being done the right way.”
It is a battle for the future, and some people, like first-time voter Cole Miller, 21, are torn.
“I’m kind of uneven about it, because Democrats are for unions and I work in a union. So I mean, if a Republican Party gets on the job of president, you never know what’s going to happen,” he said.
“Beliefs-wise, I’m definitely a Republican, but you kind of gotta pick your livelihood compared to your beliefs,” Miller said. “It’s sticky.”
Published at Mon, 26 Aug 2024 08:00:00 +0000
Israeli airstrikes hit Lebanon as Hezbollah launches hundreds of rockets across border
Israel launched a wave of airstrikes across southern Lebanon early Sunday in what it said was a pre-emptive strike to avert a large Hezbollah attack. The militant group responded that it had launched hundreds of rockets and drones to avenge the killing of one of its top commanders last month.
The heavy exchange of fire does not appear to have ignited a long-feared war, but the situation remains tense.
Meanwhile, Egypt was hosting high-level talks aimed at brokering a ceasefire in the 10-month-old Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, which diplomats hope will tamp down regional tensions.
The Israeli military said it struck because Hezbollah was planning to launch a heavy barrage of rockets and missiles. Soon after, Hezbollah said it had launched an attack on Israeli military positions as an initial response to the killing of Fouad Shukur in an Israeli airstrike in Beirut last month.
By mid-morning, it appeared that the exchange had ended, with both sides saying they had only aimed at military targets. At least three fighters were killed in the strikes on Lebanon, while there were no reports of casualties in Israel.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the military had eliminated “thousands of rockets that were aimed at northern Israel.”
“We are determined to do everything to defend our country, to return the residents of the north securely to their homes and to continue upholding a simple rule: Whoever harms us — we will harm them,” he said.
Air raid sirens and flight diversions
Air raid sirens were reported throughout northern Israel, and Israel’s Ben Gurion international airport closed and diverted flights for about an hour due to the threat of attack. Israel’s Home Front Command raised the alert level across northern Israel before later lifting restrictions in most areas.
Lt.-Col. Nadav Shoshani, an Israeli military spokesperson, said Hezbollah had intended to hit targets in northern and central Israel. He said initial assessments found “very little damage” in Israel, but that the military remained on high alert. He said around 100 Israeli aircraft took part in Sunday’s strikes.
Two Hezbollah fighters and a militant from an allied group were killed, the groups said. The Lebanese Health Ministry said two people were wounded.
Hezbollah said its attack involved more than 320 Katyusha rockets aimed at multiple sites in Israel and a “large number” of drones. It said the operation targeted “a qualitative Israeli military target that will be announced later” as well as “enemy sites and barracks and Iron Dome [missile defence] platforms.”
Hezbollah said the strikes would allow it to launch more attacks deeper into Israel, but a later statement said “military operations for today have been completed.” It dismissed Israel’s claim to have thwarted a stronger attack, without providing evidence for its own claims.
Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, was expected to give a speech later on Sunday.
After an emergency government meeting, Lebanon’s caretaker Economy Minister Amin Salam said officials were “feeling a bit more optimistic” about a de-escalation.
“We feel more reassured since both sides confirmed that the expected operations ended, and we know that the negotiations in Cairo are very serious,” he said.
U.S. President Joe Biden was “closely monitoring events in Israel and Lebanon,” according to Sean Savett, a spokesperson for the U.S. National Security Council.
The Pentagon said Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin spoke with his Israeli counterpart, Yoav Gallant, about Israel’s defences. The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. CQ Brown, is on a visit to the region that is expected to take him to Israel, Egypt and Jordan.
All-out war ‘unlikely’ for now
Randa Slim, a senior fellow at the Washington, D.C.-based Middle East Institute, said Sunday morning’s exchange was “still within the rules of engagement and unlikely at this point to lead to an all-out war.”
Danny Citrinowicz, an expert at Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies, said Hezbollah might be trying to “balance the equation without escalating into war.” Each side is now hoping their narrative will be sufficient for them to declare victory and avoid a wider confrontation, he said.
A series of attacks and assassinations in recent days are pushing simmering Middle East tensions even closer to a boiling point. CBC’s Ellen Mauro breaks down the key events in recent days and why they’re fuelling fears of a wider conflict.
Hezbollah began attacking Israel almost immediately after the start of the war in Gaza, which was triggered by Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack in Israel. Israel and Hezbollah have been exchanging fire almost daily, displacing tens of thousands of people on both sides of the border.
Hezbollah, which fought Israel to a stalemate in the summer of 2006, is believed to be far more powerful than it was during that conflict. The United States and Israel estimate it has some 150,000 rockets and is capable of hitting anywhere inside Israel.
The group has also developed drones capable of evading Israel’s defences, as well as precision-guided munitions.
Israel has vowed a crushing response to any major Hezbollah attack. It has an extensive, multi-tiered missile defence system, and it is backed by a U.S.-led coalition that helped it shoot down hundreds of missiles and drones fired from Iran earlier this year.
The U.S. military has been building up its forces across the region in recent weeks.
Hezbollah is a close ally of Iran, which has also threatened to retaliate against Israel for the killing of a senior Hamas leader, Ismail Haniyeh, in an explosion in Tehran last month. Israel has not said whether it was involved.
A sequence of attacks between Israel and Hezbollah this week marks the most significant escalation of tensions on the Israel-Lebanon border since Oct. 7. It comes as officials from Israel, Qatar, Egypt and the U.S. met in Rome over the weekend to discuss a ceasefire in Gaza. Former hostage negotiator Gershon Baskin joins Power & Politics to discuss how the Israel-Hezbollah conflict could play into negotiations.
Iranian state media on Sunday played up the Hezbollah attack, calling it a success, but there was no immediate comment from Iranian officials.
The U.S. and other mediators see a ceasefire in Gaza as key to heading off a wider Mideast conflict. Hezbollah has said it will halt its strikes on Israel if there is a ceasefire in Gaza.
Egypt is hosting high-level talks in Cairo on Sunday aimed at bridging the gaps in an evolving proposal for a truce and the release of scores of hostages held by Hamas. The talks were to be attended by CIA director William Burns and David Barnea, the head of Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency.
Hamas sent a delegation to the Egyptian capital to be briefed by Egyptian and Qatari mediators but is not directly taking part in the negotiations.
Published at Sun, 25 Aug 2024 13:54:12 +0000
