Ten House Republicans acknowledge need to solve climate crisis, but need to walk their talk

Media Releases

Media Contacts

Environment America

WASHINGTON, D.C. — In anticipation of Pope Francis’s visit to the United States next week, today ten House Republicans formally acknowledged the problem of climate change and called for action to solve it. The resolution, led by Rep. Chris Gibson of New York and cosponsored by Reps. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Carlos Curbelo of Florida, Robert Dold of Illinois, Dave Reichert of Washington, Pat Meehan, Ryan Costello, and Mike Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania, and Richard Hanna and Elise Stefanik of New York, reads in part, “the House of Representatives commits to working constructively […] to study and address the causes and effects of measured changes to our global and regional climate.”
 
More than half of the resolution’s sponsors– Reps. Ros-Lehtinen, Reichert, Meehan, Costello, Fitzpatrick, and Stefanik – voted recently against the Clean Power Plan, the carbon pollution limits on power plants finalized last month that polluters and their allies in the congressional leadership are trying to block.
 
Environment America’s Anna Aurilio released the following statement in response to today’s resolution:
 
“Before you can solve a problem, you have to acknowledge it, so we’re glad these members of Congress agree that global warming is real and should be mitigated. In doing so, they’re siding with 97 percent of the world’s scientists and broad, bipartisan majorities of Americans.
 
“But we need them all to walk their talk on climate. The first step is for all of the sponsors of today’s resolution to back the Clean Power Plan, the biggest single action the U.S. has ever proposed to cut carbon pollution.”