*CLIMATE PLANS of Dem. Candidates, Fla Climate Issues, Tampa Bay Times

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- 'Climate change expected to take center stage during this week’s Democratic debates.' Recent polls show that the issue is a litmus test for many Democratic voters, and the party’s candidates have responded with more detailed and aggressive proposals than were imagined even four years ago. Mary Ellen Klas, Tampa Bay Times, June 23, 2019. EXCERPTS:

As 20 Democratic candidates arrive in Miami this week for the first round of presidential debates, the region of tide-swollen floods, hurricane-battered communities and toxic-algae infestations is providing a vivid backdrop for an issue that has emerged as a top priority for many voters: climate change. > Recent polls show that the issue is a litmus test for many Democratic voters, and the party’s candidates have responded with more detailed and aggressive proposals than were imagined even four years ago.

Washington Gov. Jay Inslee has made climate change the center of his campaign and released two packages of proposals that include shutting down all coal plants by 2030 and investing $3 trillion in emissions-efficient transportation, infrastructure and housing. Former Texas Rep. Beto O’Rourke has used his climate proposal to bring renewed attention to his faltering campaign. And Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, former Vice President Joe Biden, New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand and New York Mayor Bill de Blasio have all embraced the GREEN NEW DEAL, the aspirational attempt to move to a low-carbon economy put forward by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York.



For an issue that received fewer than six minutes of total attention in the 2016 debates between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, climate change has now become an election-year centerpiece and serves to bring into focus a sharp contrast between Democrats and Trump, who has tweeted that global warming was a “hoax” and perpetrated by the Chinese. Democratic pollsters say that in surveys and focus groups, climate change often matches healthcare in importance for voters. The Center for American Progress Action Fund’s poll of likely Democratic voters in the first four primary states ranked climate change as the top priority — tied with healthcare.

- Slow rising crisis: For Democrats, the focus on energy and climate is not totally new. President Jimmy Carter talked about solar panels in 1976, but it’s taken more than 40 years for the issue to emerge as a moral imperative, spurred in part by a generation of millennial voters with progressive stands on global warming. Because any path to the White House leads through Florida, state Democrats say that the primary field would be wise to address the issue aggressively with specifics. U.S. Rep. Kathy Castor, a Tampa Democrat who chairs the newly created House Select Committee on the Climate Crisis, said that unlike other states that developed statewide clean energy goals, > Florida “lost a decade” because former Gov. Rick Scott and the Republican-led Legislature never made addressing sea level rise a priority. “Florida is behind, so this is a perfect opportunity for the presidential candidates to speak to this,’’ Castor said during a call with reporters Friday. “What is their plan? We’re going to be listening very closely.”

While there is no disagreement among Democrats that the next president must address climate change as a priority, the degree to which candidates have detailed their strategies differs greatly. Nearly all of them say they would rejoin the Paris climate accords, a landmark international agreement designed to accelerate investments needed for a sustainable low carbon future. President Trump has withdrawn from the agreement because, he said, it will have a “draconian” impact on the U.S. economy. By contrast, the Democrats say they will use climate change to spark investment, innovation and create new jobs for a “green” economy.

- Candidates thinking green: WARREN proposes a “green manufacturing plan” that would spend $2 trillion over 10 years for environmentally sustainable research, manufacturing and exports, intended to help “achieve the ambitious targets of the GREEN NEW DEAL.” O’ROURKE, the former Texas congressman, would spend $5 trillion over 10 years on green investments. INSLEE, the Washington governor, proposes spending $3 trillion, and Biden has proposed $1.7 trillion in climate spending. As with any debate, the odds of candidates overproducing promises while coming up short on the details are high. INSLEE, BIDEN, WARREN and O’ROURKE appear to have the most detailed plans to date.

BIDEN and INSLEE want Congress to pass a law by 2025 to establish some form of price or tax on carbon dioxide pollution, an approach most economists say is the most effective way to fight climate change. But the idea has been unpopular with voters — with ballot initiatives in Inslee’s own state failing twice. When Barack Obama was president he proposed a carbon tax in 2010 and, even though Democrats controlled both the House and Senate, the idea was scuttled amid Republican claims that it would impose a national energy tax on consumers. BIDEN'S plan calls for rolling back Trump’s tax breaks on corporations and using it to finance clean energy and other initiatives over 10 years. WARREN also supports massive investment in clean and renewable energy initiatives, calling for the creation of a National Institutes of Clean Energy...

MORE, https://www.tampabay.com/florida-politics/buzz/2019/06/23/climate-change-expected-to-take-center-stage-during-this-weeks-democratic-debates/

More, Florida Climate Issues, Daily Kos, 6/26/19
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2019/6/26/1867497/-Democrats-take-stage-tonight-for-debates-global-Climate-Emergency-will-be-difficult-to-ignore-in-Fla?utm_campaign=recent