Why Climate Moving to the Background of the Presidential Campaign is Good News
The purpose of campaigns is to win elections. Backgrounding climate in the Harris Walz campaign can help do this -- and serve the longer-term objective of mainstreaming climate action.
I’ve got good news! Climate policy is moving into the background of the Presidential campaign. Despite Vice President Harris casting the tie-breaking vote to pass the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), the largest climate bill in history, and championing of the Green New Deal in the Senate, the Harris campaign is light on climate policy specifics.
At first blush, this seems surprising. The Harris campaign is quite strategic—and Americans are increasingly concerned about the climate. According to research from Yale Climate Communications, 57% of Americans are alarmed (28%) or concerned (29%) about Climate Change while only 22% are doubtful (11%) or dismissive (11%). So why doesn’t Harris’ notable set of climate achievements + voter concern = climate as a key pillar of the campaign?
Theories abound, with several leading ones ending up in a New York Times article on why “green leaders” are ok with this lack of policy specificity. One theory is that Harris and Walz are already associated with climate action, so they don’t need to provide specifics to excite environmental voters. Another is that the lack of specifics helps the campaign “triangulate” with undecided voters in critical swing states like Pennsylvania where fracking is a big industry (side note: when a campaign ‘triangulates,’ it risks becoming a phony-sounding blob that Trump can steamroll).
Both of these arguments are legitimate, but I think that they miss the bigger story, which is that backgrounding climate as an electoral issue may help us weave the fight against climate change into all aspects of government administration and private sector business operations. Mainstreaming and integrating climate action into our day-to-day work isn’t a great campaign slogan, but it should be our goal. It’s how change happens.
To that end, I think that the largest climate-related tasks for the future Harris Administration will be implementing the Inflation Reduction Act, enhancing and democratizing access to primary data for climate measurement, and aligning US manufacturing and trade policy with most recent European climate policies such as the CSRD. The good news is that driving this type of steady administration seems to be how Harris likes to operate as a leader.
The need for competent government administration is why Biden tried to run on a slogan of “finish the job” (it didn’t go well), why I’m so afraid of Trump’s plan to fire federal workers and replace them with intentionally incompetent partisan hacks, and why implementing the IRA isn’t an energizing political topic to run on.
Much of my work in corporate sustainability has focused on the operational integration of sustainability. It isn’t as exciting or splashy as investing in a new wind farm, but the slow “greening” of business operations, revenue models, and procurement policies is how we are going to decarbonize the economy. It’ll happen in the background for most, and slowly just become the way things get done.
These days, climate policy is all about getting shit done. Let’s get to work.
Love the provocative title – interesting and thoughtful take. Things may change a bit in the next month as the Harris campaign releases more detail on a policy platform, but I think the relative backrounding of climate is a trend that will continue through the election.
This is what you seem to be getting at with your "triangulation" point – but I attribute this to fairly basic (but still interesting) campaign strategy. I'd distinguish between two general categories of issues in American politics today – 'Energizing' problems and 'Coalition-Building' problems. The former includes issues that the left-of-center base cares deeply about and excites them – driving fundraising, volunteering, and campaign growth (e.g. climate change, trans issues, social justice) – but may repel moderates. The latter includes issues where there's general consensus between the left and moderates and can attract centrists/moderate Rs without alienating progressives (e.g. inflation is bad, border should be more secure, etc.).
Harris' campaign seems to be leaning aggressively into messaging around the latter set of issues. She and Walz are already perceived as ~ progressives, and they've been doing very well on the enthusiasm front – so it makes sense to focus on the coalition-building side.
It's interesting to contrast that with Biden's campaign, which had the opposite problem/strength in 2020. He entered the race with broader coalition support, but lacked enthusiasm; that's why I think his campaign leaned so heavily into messaging around climate.
I think the big outstanding question is to what extent a potential Harris admin would prioritize climate against other issues. It's been commonly remarked that Obama had to choose between major change on healthcare and climate and chose healthcare. Biden prioritized climate and infrastructure. Would be interesting to see whether a Harris Admin would be just an ally (e.g. just implement IRA) or a leader on climate (more ambitious new policy like a US CSRD or CBAM etc.).