DeSantis Represents A GOP Moving From Flat-Out Denial And Lies To Inertia & Greenwashing
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Trump’s 2024 announcement speech makes no mention of climate change, but he did talk a lot about energy policy and “energy dominance,” a term his administration used often. Unlike 2016, when his outlandish claims about China were on the fringe of Republican viewpoints, this terminology became commonplace among GOP politicians and right-wing think tanks like the Heritage Foundation. Many of the talking points he laid out in this initial speech—that the Biden administration is driving up energy costs, that under GOP control America could achieve “energy independence”—are things that the GOP as a larger party is also repeating throughout the energy crisis. In other words, when it comes to climate change and energy policy, Trump’s speech is almost boring, routine—a far cry from his kookiness in 2016.
Will anyone be facing off against him? Of the potential field, Ron DeSantis—who is being floated as an early front runner, and the strongest challenger to Trump—is probably also the one with the strongest environmental record, at least at first glance. As the governor of Florida since 2019, DeSantis has had to directly contend with the impacts of climate change, and has in some ways responded aggressively, establishing a fund to help local communities adapt to and resist sea level rise in Florida. He has also made promises to oppose offshore drilling, and vetoed some bad anti-renewables policies; by Trumpian standards, DeSantis is practically Bill McKibben. In some lights, DeSantis truly does look like the future of the Republican party: seemingly accepting that some climate change is happening and putting real resources towards mitigation and fixing some of the most egregious pollution issues. (These moves earned him praise for “go[ing] bold on climate change” back in 2019 from the Orlando Sun-Sentinel.)
Any president, some would argue, who accepts the reality of climate change and who is committed to some solutions is better than one who outright denies it. But as I’ve written before, the seeming tack towards reality from the right in recent years is nothing more than a smokescreen to allow the GOP to continue doing nothing on the causes of climate change. Outright climate denial was, after all, overwhelmingly funded and supported by oil and gas interests; those same interests have largely pivoted towards “solutions” that help them keep producing fossil fuels while portraying themselves to the general public as working to address climate change and help with the energy transition. It makes sense that the politicians they keep funding would adopt this attitude. And for all his seemingly pro-environmental viewpoints, DeSantis seems distinctly uninterested in addressing the causes of the sea level rise. He has proclaimed that he is “not in the pews of the church of the global warming leftists,” and signed a law last year forbidding Floridian cities from totally phasing out the use of fossil fuels. He has also used similar language to Trump when it comes to fossil fuels, blasting the Biden administration for failing to “unleash American energy” by crippling domestic oil and gas—a common right-wing talking point that also happens to be extremely wrong.
The dangerous thing about Republicans moving past denial and into this faux acceptance is that it’s much harder to respond to on the campaign trail. For the past decade, calling out and shaming climate deniers in the GOP has been a strategy on the left. Yet it seems that Democrats haven’t adequately developed an appropriate response to a DeSantis-esque candidate, who may be able to trot out climate bona fides while claiming to be concerned about “energy independence.” Acknowledging that climate change is a reality while making no moves to address its core issues is barely better than flat-out denial. In fact, refusing to see that we need to phase out fossil fuels is, in and of itself, an anti-science stance. But given how Democrats themselves have only been able to pass a climate bill this year, it’s hard to see a way for them to rally enough in time to fight back against a candidate more nuanced on climate than a flat-out denier.
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https://gizmodo.com/ron-desantis-climate-change-issues-republican-party-1849814138