Ramanan Krishnamoorti, UH Chief Energy Officer and Aparajita Datta, UH Research Scholar
The breakthrough in negotiations amongst Democrats in the U.S. Senate on the proposed climate bill surprised many and recentered the climate discussion across the nation. If the bill, also known as the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, passes through budget reconciliation, it could potentially reduce U.S. emissions by 40% by 2030.
Despite the national security, economic and energy independence benefits the bill may lead to, it has not received any support from Republicans. Lawmakers from red states have remained unmoved on climate legislation for decades. The gridlock over climate change is not new but the scale of the legislative paralysis is. The right and the left are more polarized now than at any point in the last 50 years. Consequently, climate change has become a prime example of “American exceptionalism” – the idea that the U.S. is inherently different from other countries – in politics. The hyperpolarization threatens our way of life, the economy and our position as a global leader.
A few recurrent questions emerge in the current landscape. First, what are the limits to powers of the executive, legislative and judicial branches? Most recently, arguments by the Republicans against executive action on climate change were upheld by the Supreme Court’s conservative supermajority in its ruling on West Virginia v. EPA, which limits the agency’s regulatory authority over curbing greenhouse gas emissions from power plants. Interestingly, the view that it is Congress that must pass laws and allocate funding for climate action – and not the President and federal agencies – seems to be shared by a majority of Americans (61%). However, in a Congress of slim majorities, what does this divide mean for policymaking, and is there a rational middle ground for climate change policy in the U.S.?
In March, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) proposed new climate disclosure rules that would require publicly traded U.S. companies to quantify, record and disclose climate-related risks and financial impacts in statements and annual reports. The proposed mandate aims to bolster investor confidence by providing accurate information on a company’s financial health and risks in a transparent and consistent format. Shortly after, SEC’s chairperson, Gary Gensler, said in an interview that “climate disclosures are already happening, and investors are already making use of information about climate risks. But there is no uniformity in how climate risk disclosures are made, making it difficult for investors to make meaningful comparisons. Companies and investors alike would benefit from clear rules of the road. Our role is to bring consistency and comparability.”
But Gensler, who was appointed by President Joe Biden, was met with quick opposition from his Republican colleagues. SEC Commissioner Hester Pierce opposed the proposed rules in a public statement titled “we are not the Securities and Environment Commission – at least not yet.”
The SEC invited public comments on the proposed rules between March 21 and June 17, and over 4,400 were submitted. We analyzed the comments using natural language processing (NLP) methods. Members of Congress submitted 14 comments, with 215 Republican and 152 Democrat lawmakers as signatories. We took a deeper dive into these comments through further qualitative and quantitative analysis.
The analysis[1] mapped the most likely topics in a document as a probability distribution. A cursory look at the analysis appeared to show some overlap between Republican and Democrat lawmakers. Although, a closer look at terms that were most likely to appear together like emissions, investor, climate, justice and environmental, revealed the divergent partisan priorities. The terms justice and environmental were not dominant themes in the Republican submissions, while the others highlight the exceptional partisan divide on the issue.
The sentiment and tone of the submissions from the Democrats indicate that they welcomed and supported the SEC’s efforts. However, they also proposed changes, citing that the rules do not go far enough to address material climate-related disclosure, specifically the inclusion of climate-related lobbying and influencing activities. U.S. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, a Democrat from Rhode Island, called the omission stunning and a missed opportunity for the SEC.
In sharp contrast, Republicans asserted that the SEC lacks statutory authority to issue the proposed rules. The GOP contends that the new rules would violate the First Amendment, do not reflect reasoned decision-making and would fail an arbitrary and capricious review[2] by the courts. Both U.S. House and Senate Republicans argued in their letters to the SEC that unelected regulators at the SEC do not have the authority for policymaking — elected members of Congress do.
Their opinions were reinforced by the attorney generals of 24 Republican states in a supplemental submission to the SEC, citing the post-deadline development of the Supreme Court’s ruling in West Virginia v. EPA and urging the SEC to abandon the proposed rules. Before the ruling, the SEC had found a likely ally in the EPA. In a submission to the SEC, the EPA stated that it supports the proposed rules and the use of the Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program, and that the Commission has broad authority to promulgate disclosure requirements that are necessary or appropriate in the public interest or for the protection of investors.
One notable exception to this political divide was Senator Joe Manchin, a Democrat serving West Virginia. In a letter to chairperson Gensler, Manchin followed themes and sentiments expressed by congressional Republicans. Manchin stressed that he firmly believes that “the SEC has a duty and responsibility to every American to uphold their mission and prevent an unraveling of our U.S. economy; however, that duty and responsibility, unfortunately, becomes tainted when the Commission publishes rules that seemingly politicize a process aimed at assessing the financial health and compliance of a public company.”
With an equally polarized electorate, it is unsurprising that recent analyses from the Pew Research Center found that 82% of Republicans believe that Biden’s climate policies are taking the country in the wrong direction, while 79% of Democrats believe the president is moving the country in the right direction on climate change. The divide prevailed before Biden took office. A survey conducted by the University of Houston at the outset of the 2020 presidential elections found that a majority of respondents were concerned about climate change and supported emissions reduction, but the devil is in the details. While 96% percent of voters on the left were concerned about climate change, just over half of the respondents (58%) on the right reported the same. While this chasm may seem wide, the gap between right and left voters has been closing in recent years with growing bipartisan support among voters for the adoption of carbon management to mitigate climate change. What voters cannot agree on is how to decarbonize.
While Americans often bemoan the loss of bipartisanship in Washington, D.C., most are willing[3] to forgive undemocratic behavior to achieve their party’s policy goals and prize party loyalty over all else. Political maneuvering and corrosion of democratic processes follow from this: Issues like climate change are framed as zero-sum games — what one gains, another must lose. Consequently, we are left with problems that never get solved. Lawmakers and voters endlessly argue over the winners and losers of each policy proposition, leaving no room for a rational middle.
Meanwhile, the verdict from the reactions to the SEC’s proposed climate disclosure rules is clear. A new manifestation of the exceptional and untenable partisan divide on key policy issues is permeating across all branches of the government. The electorate and politicians have lost sight of the fact that when it comes to climate change, the collective goals of voters are becoming more aligned while the parties simultaneously move apart from the ideological center. In the absence of bipartisan efforts to reach a rational middle, the American exceptionalism in addressing climate change is likely to continue and wild swings of the policy pendulum should be anticipated.
[1] A Latent Dirichlet Allocation algorithm is an unsupervised learning algorithm that maps a user-specified number of topics shared by documents in a text corpus as a probability distribution.
[2] The arbitrary-or-capricious test defined in the 1946 Administrative Procedure Act (APA), which instructs courts reviewing the actions of agencies to invalidate any rulemaking that they find to be “arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of discretion, or otherwise not in accordance with law.”
[3] The study found that only 3.5% of U.S. voters would cast ballots against their preferred candidates as a punishment for undemocratic behavior.
Dr. Ramanan Krishnamoorti is the Chief Energy Officer at the University of Houston. Prior to his current position, Krishnamoorti served as interim vice president for research and technology transfer for UH and the UH System. During his tenure at the university, he has served as chair of the UH Cullen College of Engineering’s chemical and biomolecular engineering department, associate dean of research for engineering, professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering with affiliated appointments as professor of petroleum engineering and professor of chemistry. Dr. Krishnamoorti obtained his bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology Madras and doctoral degree in chemical engineering from Princeton University in 1994.
Aparajita Datta is a Research Scholar at UH Energy and a Ph.D. student in the Department of Political Science studying public policy and international relations. Her research is focused on policy diffusion and feedback analyses to improve energy equity and justice for low-income communities in the U.S. Aparajita holds a bachelor’s degree in computer science and engineering from the University of Petroleum and Energy Studies, India; and master’s degrees in energy management, and public policy from the University of Houston.
NEW YORK (AP) — In a new video posted early Election Day, Beyoncé channels Pamela Anderson in the television program “Baywatch” – red one-piece swimsuit and all – and asks viewers to vote.
In the two-and-a-half-minute clip, set to most of “Bodyguard,” a four-minute cut from her 2024 country album “Cowboy Carter,” Beyoncé cosplays as Anderson’s character before concluding with a simple message, written in white text: “Happy Beylloween,” followed by “Vote.”
At a rally for Donald Trump in Pittsburgh on Monday night, the former president spoke dismissively about Beyoncé’s appearance at a Kamala Harris rally in Houston in October, drawing boos for the megastar from his supporters.
“Beyoncé would come in. Everyone’s expecting a couple of songs. There were no songs. There was no happiness,” Trump said.
She did not perform — unlike in 2016, when she performed at a presidential campaign rally for Hillary Clinton in Cleveland – but she endorsed Harris and gave a moving speech, initially joined onstage by her Destiny’s Child bandmate Kelly Rowland.
“I’m not here as a celebrity, I’m not here as a politician. I’m here as a mother,” Beyoncé said.
“A mother who cares deeply about the world my children and all of our children live in, a world where we have the freedom to control our bodies, a world where we’re not divided,” she said at the rally in Houston, her hometown.
“Imagine our daughters growing up seeing what’s possible with no ceilings, no limitations,” she continued. “We must vote, and we need you.”
Harris used the song in July during her first official public appearance as a presidential candidate at her campaign headquarters in Delaware. That same month, Beyoncé’s mother, Tina Knowles, publicly endorsed Harris for president.
Beyoncé gave permission to Harris to use the song, a campaign official who was granted anonymity to discuss private campaign operations confirmed to The Associated Press.
Outside of sports and a “Cold front coming down from Canada,” American news media only report on Canadian events that they believe are, or will be, influential to the US. Therefore, when Justin Trudeau’s announcement, having finally read the room, that Canada will be reducing the number of permanent residents admitted by more than 20 percent and temporary residents like skilled workers and college students will be cut by more than half made news south of the border, I knew the American media felt Trudeau’s about-face on immigration was newsworthy because many Americans would relate to Trudeau realizing Canada was accepting more immigrants than it could manage and are hoping their next POTUS will follow Trudeau’s playbook.
Canada, with lots of space and lacking convenient geographical ways for illegal immigrants to enter the country, though still many do, has a global reputation for being incredibly accepting of immigrants. On the surface, Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver appear to be multicultural havens. However, as the saying goes, “Too much of a good thing is never good,” resulting in a sharp rise in anti-immigrant sentiment, which you can almost taste in the air. A growing number of Canadians, regardless of their political affiliation, are blaming recent immigrants for causing the housing affordability crises, inflation, rise in crime and unemployment/stagnant wages.
Throughout history, populations have engulfed themselves in a tribal frenzy, a psychological state where people identify strongly with their own group, often leading to a ‘us versus them’ mentality. This has led to quick shifts from complacency to panic and finger-pointing at groups outside their tribe, a phenomenon that is not unique to any particular culture or time period.
My take on why the American news media found Trudeau’s blatantly obvious attempt to save his political career, balancing appeasement between the pitchfork crowd, who want a halt to immigration until Canada gets its house in order, and immigrant voters, who traditionally vote Liberal, newsworthy; the American news media, as do I, believe immigration fatigue is why Kamala Harris is going to lose on November 5th.
Because they frequently get the outcome wrong, I don’t take polls seriously. According to polls in 2014, Tim Hudak’s Progressive Conservatives and Kathleen Wynne’s Liberals were in a dead heat in Ontario, yet Wynne won with more than twice as many seats. In the 2018 Quebec election, most polls had the Coalition Avenir Québec with a 1-to-5-point lead over the governing Liberals. The result: The Coalition Avenir Québec enjoyed a landslide victory, winning 74 of 125 seats. Then there’s how the 2016 US election polls showing Donald Trump didn’t have a chance of winning against Hillary Clinton were ridiculously way off, highlighting the importance of the election day poll and, applicable in this election as it was in 2016, not to discount ‘shy Trump supporters;’ voters who support Trump but are hesitant to express their views publicly due to social or political pressure.
My distrust in polls aside, polls indicate Harris is leading by a few points. One would think that Trump’s many over-the-top shenanigans, which would be entertaining were he not the POTUS or again seeking the Oval Office, would have him far down in the polls. Trump is toe-to-toe with Harris in the polls because his approach to the economy—middle-class Americans are nostalgic for the relatively strong economic performance during Trump’s first three years in office—and immigration, which Americans are hyper-focused on right now, appeals to many Americans. In his quest to win votes, Trump is doing what anyone seeking political office needs to do: telling the people what they want to hear, strategically using populism—populism that serves your best interests is good populism—to evoke emotional responses. Harris isn’t doing herself any favours, nor moving voters, by going the “But, but… the orange man is bad!” route, while Trump cultivates support from “weird” marginal voting groups.
To Harris’s credit, things could have fallen apart when Biden abruptly stepped aside. Instead, Harris quickly clinched the nomination and had a strong first few weeks, erasing the deficit Biden had given her. The Democratic convention was a success, as was her acceptance speech. Her performance at the September 10th debate with Donald Trump was first-rate.
Harris’ Achilles heel is she’s now making promises she could have made and implemented while VP, making immigration and the economy Harris’ liabilities, especially since she’s been sitting next to Biden, watching the US turn into the circus it has become. These liabilities, basically her only liabilities, negate her stance on abortion, democracy, healthcare, a long-winning issue for Democrats, and Trump’s character. All Harris has offered voters is “feel-good vibes” over substance. In contrast, Trump offers the tangible political tornado (read: steamroll the problems Americans are facing) many Americans seek. With Trump, there’s no doubt that change, admittedly in a messy fashion, will happen. If enough Americans believe the changes he’ll implement will benefit them and their country…
The case against Harris on immigration, at a time when there’s a huge global backlash to immigration, even as the American news media are pointing out, in famously immigrant-friendly Canada, is relatively straightforward: During the first three years of the Biden-Harris administration, illegal Southern border crossings increased significantly.
The words illegal immigration, to put it mildly, irks most Americans. On the legal immigration front, according to Forbes, most billion-dollar startups were founded by immigrants. Google, Microsoft, and Oracle, to name three, have immigrants as CEOs. Immigrants, with tech skills and an entrepreneurial thirst, have kept America leading the world. I like to think that Americans and Canadians understand the best immigration policy is to strategically let enough of these immigrants in who’ll increase GDP and tax base and not rely on social programs. In other words, Americans and Canadians, and arguably citizens of European countries, expect their governments to be more strategic about immigration.
The days of the words on a bronze plaque mounted inside the Statue of Liberty pedestal’s lower level, “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free…” are no longer tolerated. Americans only want immigrants who’ll benefit America.
Does Trump demagogue the immigration issue with xenophobic and racist tropes, many of which are outright lies, such as claiming Haitian immigrants in Ohio are abducting and eating pets? Absolutely. However, such unhinged talk signals to Americans who are worried about the steady influx of illegal immigrants into their country that Trump can handle immigration so that it’s beneficial to the country as opposed to being an issue of economic stress.
In many ways, if polls are to be believed, Harris is paying the price for Biden and her lax policies early in their term. Yes, stimulus spending quickly rebuilt the job market, but at the cost of higher inflation. Loosen border policies at a time when anti-immigrant sentiment was increasing was a gross miscalculation, much like Trudeau’s immigration quota increase, and Biden indulging himself in running for re-election should never have happened.
If Trump wins, Democrats will proclaim that everyone is sexist, racist and misogynous, not to mention a likely White Supremacist, and for good measure, they’ll beat the “voter suppression” button. If Harris wins, Trump supporters will repeat voter fraud—since July, Elon Musk has tweeted on Twitter at least 22 times about voters being “imported” from abroad—being widespread.
Regardless of who wins tomorrow, Americans need to cool down; and give the divisive rhetoric a long overdue break. The right to an opinion belongs to everyone. Someone whose opinion differs from yours is not by default sexist, racist, a fascist or anything else; they simply disagree with you. Americans adopting the respectful mindset to agree to disagree would be the best thing they could do for the United States of America.
PHOENIX (AP) — Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a prominent proponent of debunked public health claims whom Donald Trump has promised to put in charge of health initiatives, said Saturday that Trump would push to remove fluoride from drinking water on his first day in office if elected president.
Fluoride strengthens teeth and reduces cavities by replacing minerals lost during normal wear and tear, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The addition of low levels of fluoride to drinking water has long been considered one of the greatest public health achievements of the last century.
Kennedy made the declaration Saturday on the social media platform X alongside a variety of claims about the heath effects of fluoride.
“On January 20, the Trump White House will advise all U.S. water systems to remove fluoride from public water,” Kennedy wrote. Trump and his wife, Melania Trump, “want to Make America Healthy Again,” he added, repeating a phrase Trump often uses and links to Kennedy.
Trump told NBC News on Sunday that he had not spoken to Kennedy about fluoride yet, “but it sounds OK to me. You know it’s possible.”
The former president declined to say whether he would seek a Cabinet role for Kennedy, a job that would require Senate confirmation, but added, “He’s going to have a big role in the administration.”
Asked whether banning certain vaccines would be on the table, Trump said he would talk to Kennedy and others about that. Trump described Kennedy as “a very talented guy and has strong views.”
The sudden and unexpected weekend social media post evoked the chaotic policymaking that defined Trump’s White House tenure, when he would issue policy declarations on Twitter at virtually all hours. It also underscored the concerns many experts have about Kennedy, who has long promoted debunked theories about vaccine safety, having influence over U.S. public health.
In 1950, federal officials endorsed water fluoridation to prevent tooth decay, and continued to promote it even after fluoride toothpaste brands hit the market several years later. Though fluoride can come from a number of sources, drinking water is the main source for Americans, researchers say.
Officials lowered their recommendation for drinking water fluoride levels in 2015 to address a tooth condition called fluorosis, that can cause splotches on teeth and was becoming more common in U.S. kids.
In August, a federal agency determined “with moderate confidence” that there is a link between higher levels of fluoride exposure and lower IQ in kids. The National Toxicology Program based its conclusion on studies involving fluoride levels at about twice the recommended limit for drinking water.
A federal judge later cited that study in ordering the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to further regulate fluoride in drinking water. U.S. District Judge Edward Chen cautioned that it’s not certain that the amount of fluoride typically added to water is causing lower IQ in kids, but he concluded that mounting research points to an unreasonable risk that it could be. He ordered the EPA to take steps to lower that risk, but didn’t say what those measures should be.
In his X post Saturday, Kennedy tagged Michael Connett, the lead attorney representing the plaintiff in that lawsuit, the environmental advocacy group Food & Water Watch.
Kennedy’s anti-vaccine organization has a lawsuit pending against news organizations including The Associated Press, accusing them of violating antitrust laws by taking action to identify misinformation, including about COVID-19 and COVID-19 vaccines. Kennedy is on leave from the group but is listed as one of its attorneys in the lawsuit.
What role Kennedy might hold if Trump wins on Tuesday remains unclear. Kennedy recently told NewsNation that Trump asked him to “reorganize” agencies including the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of Health, the Food and Drug Administration and some agencies under the Department of Agriculture.
But for now, the former independent presidential candidate has become one of Trump’s top surrogates. Trump frequently mentions having the support of Kennedy, a scion of a Democratic dynasty and the son of former Attorney General Robert Kennedy and nephew of President John F. Kennedy.
Kennedy traveled with Trump Friday and spoke at his rallies in Michigan and Wisconsin.
Trump said Saturday that he told Kennedy: “You can work on food, you can work on anything you want” except oil policy.
“He wants health, he wants women’s health, he wants men’s health, he wants kids, he wants everything,” Trump added.
