This is one in a series of States Newsroom reports on the major political issues in the presidential race.
Joe Biden’s 2020 campaign identified it as one of the major crises facing the country. Climate change has received much less attention in the 2024 presidential race.
The candidates, former Republican Party President Donald Trump and Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris, share the dual goals of lowering energy costs and increasing energy jobs in the U.S., but they differ significantly in their plans to achieve that goal.
On the campaign trail, each spent relatively little time describing their own plans, instead criticizing the other as extreme.
Harris supports the development of renewable energy, which provides energy without emitting greenhouse gases, which are the main cause of climate change.
She bragged about her deciding vote in the U.S. Senate in favor of the Inflation Reduction Act, a sweeping domestic policy bill that Democrats pushed along party lines that provides hundreds of millions in tidy energy tax breaks.
Trump supports the production of fossil fuels, blaming renewable energy policies for rising energy prices. He called for the removal of bans on modern oil and gas exploration to augment the supply of inexpensive fuel and reduce costs.
Promise: Promote fossil fuels
Both candidates promise to reduce energy costs.
For Trump, that meant bashing the Biden-Harris administration for encouraging renewable energy production.
Inflation was caused by “stupid spending on the Green New Deal, which turned out to be the New Green Scam,” Trump said at a Sept. 26 news conference. “Have you noticed that they never mention the environment anymore? What happened to the environment?”
The former president said during the September 25 election campaign that he would “cut energy costs in half” by reducing regulations and lowering taxes.
He did not make a detailed plan to achieve this goal.
Trump’s argument suggests that the Biden administration’s focus on renewable energy has hampered oil and gas production, limiting supply and driving up prices.
However, Harris outlined her support for renewable energy types as part of a broader portfolio that includes fossil fuels.
Harris emphasized that the Inflation Reduction Act opened up modern oil and gas leases while providing incentives for wind and solar energy.
“I’m proud that as vice president, we have invested trillions of dollars in the clean energy economy over the last four years while increasing domestic gas production to historic levels,” she said during an ABC News debate with Trump on September 10. .
AND report released this month by the U.S. Energy Information Administration showed that U.S. fossil fuel production will reach its highest level on record in 2023.
Promise: Promote renewable energy sources
Harris also pointed to IRA provisions that provide consumers with tax credits for green technologies such as home heat pumps as a way to reduce costs.
“Thanks to the House Energy Technology Tax Credits in the Inflation Reduction Act, more than 3.4 million American families saved $8.4 billion in 2023,” her campaign’s 82-page economic plan reads.
Trump also says he supports some climate-friendly technologies, including megadonor Elon Musk’s Tesla electric vehicle brand, but Democrats have overinvested in non-fossil fuels.
He called elements of the Inflation Reduction Act “gifts” and described spending on electric vehicle charging infrastructure as waste.
The promise: bring back jobs
Biden has long talked about transitioning away from fossil fuels to benefit American workers and put them at the forefront of growing industries.
Harris similarly framed the issue in economic terms, arguing that the Inflation Control Act and other climate policies created jobs.
“When I was vice president, we created over 800,000 new manufacturing jobs,” she said during the Sept. 10 debate. “We have invested in clean energy to the point where we are opening factories around the world.”
During a campaign stop in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania this month, Harris said Trump’s focus on fossil fuels would hamper job growth, saying he would “send thousands of good-paying clean energy jobs overseas.”
Trump and his running mate, Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance, have said Democrats’ focus on renewable energy has reduced existing energy jobs.
“We have great energy workers in Ohio and across the country,” Vance said during an August campaign stop in his home state. “They want to earn a reasonable wage and they want to drive the American economy. Why don’t we have a president who allows them to do exactly that?
“Unleash American energy,” he said. “Practice, baby, practice and let’s turn the page on this madness.”
The promise: Repeal the Democrats’ climate bill
Trump sharply criticized Democrats’ climate bill, blaming its spending for rising inflation.
“To further defeat inflation, my plan will end the Green New Deal, which I call the Green New Scam. Probably the greatest fraud in history,” the Economic Club of New York said in a September 5 speech.
He announced that as president he would transfer any unspent funds in accordance with the law.
Trump has sought to distance himself from the political agenda Project 2025written by the Heritage Institute.
But the conservative think tank’s findings do have some overlap with what Trump says he plans to do during his second term in the White House.
Project 2025 proposes repealing the Inflation Reduction Act, describing it as a subsidy to special interests.
Harris often mentions his deciding vote for the bill and describes his plans as president to expand the bill’s goals.
Harris’ policy plan said she was “proud to cast” the deciding vote for the climate bill and that as president she “will continue to invest in a thriving clean energy economy.”
She added that she would seek to improve that spending by cutting regulations “so that clean energy projects can be implemented quickly and efficiently in a way that protects our environment and public health.”
YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE.
