Election Special: Navigating the Climate Vote

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Sep 16

The election cycle can feel overwhelming for the average person who is climate-concerned, but not deeply political enough to understand where and how to plug in. If you have money to give, where should it go? If you have time to contribute, what should you do? We could think of no better group than the experts we have here to help walk us through it.

Tiernan Sittenfeld is the Senior Vice President of Government Affairs at LCV or the League of Conservation Voters, among many other things. LCV assigns every member of the U.S. Congress with a national environmental Scorecard, which is a handy tool for tracking their voter record on issues related to climate change.

Caroline Spears is the Executive Director at Climate Cabinet, which she describes as Moneyball meets climate policy. Climate Cabinet analyzes local climate and governance data to uncover high-leverage races and candidates across thousands of local offices. Caroline joined us previously on the pod a few years ago for a deep dive about her journey and her work.

Eliza Nemser is the Co-founder and Executive Director at Climate Changemakers, a modern climate advocacy network built for busy, productive people. They help individuals take productive climate action through action playbooks, issue briefings and hour-of-action co-working sessions. Eliza is also a repeat guest on the show.

A few disclaimers: One, this episode tends to be pretty pro-Democrat. Some of that comes from top-of-the-ticket sentiment such as former President Trump's withdrawal of the U.S. from the Paris Climate Agreement. Some of it comes from the most recent experience in Congress where the Inflation Reduction Act faced a 51 to 50 vote in the Senate that was evenly split down party lines with Vice President Harris breaking the tie. This is not to say that all Democrats are strong on climate. The Inflation Reduction Act nearly died many times inside the Democratic Party before it passed. And if you look up and down Congress and even farther into state and local politics, there are a wide range of LCV scores for Democratic candidates and there are some Republicans who are strong on climate issues as well. The second disclaimer is that climate is a huge topic. We didn't take time in the episode to talk about what it means to be a "climate voter."

We've learned one thing over the years, that you should never assume that climate-concerned people always agree on solutions. We intentionally didn't spend time going deep into the pros and cons of different policy platforms. And yes, there is an argument to be made that natural gas is a bridge fuel and that replacing coal aggressively with gas will help our emissions problem. But this episode is meant for people who already know they want to see progress around clean energy deployment across our economy and want some ideas on how to get involved in the election cycle.

*Watch the MCJ Collective member hub for a special Ask-Me-Anything session with Climate Changemakers.

Episode recorded on Aug 30, 2024 (Published on Sept 16, 2024)

In this episode, we cover:

[5:00] Intro to Tiernan and LCV
[6:16] Intro to Caroline and Climate Cabinet
[7:30] Intro to Eliza and Climate Changemakers
[9:02] Climate stakes in this election
[15:30] House and Senate race importance
[21:30] Climate's political divide
[28:45] House stakes this cycle
[34:30] Texas election outlook
[39:20] Key states to watch
[42:17] Climate champion governors
[44:13] LCV candidate scoring
[47:15] Supporting candidates financially
[57:22] How to participate and engage
[1:08:21] Improving accessibility and outcomes

Cody Simms (00:00:00):
From MCJ, I'm Cody Simms, and today on My Climate Journey we're doing a 2024 climate voter election special. And we have three incredible guests for this. Tiernan Sittenfeld is the senior Vice President of government Affairs at LCV or the League of Conservation Voters, among many other things. LCV assigns every member of the U.S. Congress with a national environmental Scorecard, which is an incredibly useful tool for tracking their voter record on issues related to climate change. Caroline Spears is the executive director at Climate Cabinet, which she describes as moneyball meets climate policy. Climate Cabinet analyzes local climate and governance data to uncover high-leverage races and candidates across thousands of local offices. Caroline joined us previously on the pod a few years ago for a deep dive all about her journey and her work at Climate Cabinet. Eliza Nemser is Co-Founder and Executive Director at Climate Changemakers, a modern climate advocacy network built for busy, productive people.
(00:00:58):
They help individuals take productive climate action through action playbooks issue briefings and hour-of-action co-working sessions. Eliza is also a repeat guest on the show. And full disclaimer, I'm a Co-Founder of Climate Changemakers with her. This episode came about when I noticed the proliferation of climate zooms starting to pop up around the election, and I realized that it can feel overwhelming for the average person who is climate-concerned, but perhaps not deeply political to understand where and how to plug in. If you have money to give, where should it go? If you have time to contribute, what should you do? And I could think of no better group than the experts we have here to help walk us through it. Now I'll start with a few disclaimers. One, this episode tends to be pretty pro-Democrat. Some of that comes from top-of-the-ticket sentiment such as former President Trump's withdrawal of the U.S. from the Paris Climate Agreement.
(00:01:55):
Some of it comes from the most recent experience in Congress where the Inflation Reduction Act, arguably the largest act of climate legislation to pass into law, faced a 51 to 50 vote in the Senate that was evenly split down party lines with all Democrats for the bill and all Republicans against with Vice President Harris breaking the tie. Now, this is not to say that all Democrats are strong on climate far from it. In fact, the Inflation Reduction Act nearly died many times inside the Democratic Party before it passed. And if you look up and down Congress and even farther into state and local politics, there are a wide range of LCV scores for Democratic candidates and there are some Republicans who are strong on climate issues as well. The second disclaimer is that climate is a huge topic. We didn't actually take time in the episode to talk about what it means to be a quote-unquote "Climate voter."
(00:02:51):
That's on me. And if I've learned one thing in hosting the show over the years, it's that I should never assume that climate-concerned people always agree on solutions. So I'll lay it out here how I think about it. I generally think of a climate voter as someone who votes in favor of expediting deployment and adoption of clean energy resources and reducing the emissions' intensity of our economy. I intentionally didn't want to spend time going deeply into pros and cons of different policy platforms. And yes, there is an argument to be made that natural gas is a bridge fuel and that replacing coal aggressively with gas will help our emissions' problem. But this episode really is meant for people who already know they want to see progress around clean energy deployment across our economy and want some ideas on how to get involved in the election cycle. So with all of that out of the way, let's jump in. But first, I'm Cody Simms.
Yin Lu (00:03:49):
I'm Yin Lu.
Jason Jacobs (00:03:50):
And I'm Jason Jacobs. And welcome to My Climate Journey.
Yin Lu (00:03:57):
This show is a growing body of knowledge focused on climate change and potential solutions.
Cody Simms (00:04:02):
In this podcast, we traverse disciplines, industries, and opinions to better understand and make sense of the formidable problem of climate change and all the ways' people like you and I can help. All right, well Tiernan, Eliza, Caroline, welcome to the show. We've got a packed room here today with four of us having a conversation, and I'm so excited to learn from each of you. This is all about the 2024 election and what's at stake and what can we do about it. For those of us, I assume is pretty much anyone listening who is concerned about climate change and thinks of it as an important policy lever. And so with that, why don't we start with each of you giving a brief introduction of yourself and the organization you work with, and then we're going to dive into the meat of the conversation. Caroline and Eliza, you two are both vets of the pod have been on before. So obviously excited to have you back. And Tiernan, welcome to the show for the first time. Let's start with you.
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:05:02):
Thank you. Very exciting to be here, Cody. And of course great to be on with Caroline and Eliza. So my name is Tiernan Sittenfeld, as you said. Thank you for the warm welcome. I'm the Senior Vice President for Government affairs at the League of Conservation Voters, which works to elect environmental champions up and down the ballot, but the work doesn't stop there. We work to elect them so that we can then work closely with them, hold their feet to the fire when necessary, strategize and advocate to ensure that we are making as much progress on all that we care about on climate change, clean energy, environmental justice, clean air and water conservation, democracy and so much more. And I lead the government affairs team and do a lot on the electoral side as well. So lots to talk about today. I'm really excited to be here.
Cody Simms (00:05:46):
Well, and holding elected officials feet to the fire on climate policy. You've had a busy few years in terms of stuff that actually got out the door, so congrats on everything that's gone on for the last four-year cycle here.
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:05:57):
Awesome team effort including with everyone on this podcast. So congrats and thanks to everyone and to all of your listeners as well. But yeah, it was thrilling to work so hard and finally make the biggest thing we've ever done on climate change, the Inflation Reduction Act, become law, and of course we have so much more progress to make. So that's what this election cycle is all about.
Cody Simms (00:06:16):
Awesome. Caroline, tell us about you and about Climate Cabinet.
Caroline Spears (00:06:19):
Hi everyone, my name's Caroline Spears. I run Climate Cabinet. We are the money for climate politics. So what we do is we sort through the hundreds of thousands of elections that happen every cycle and we find the ones that have the biggest bang for your buck, the biggest climate impact for time spent on climate. So this year it's 2024. As we're recording this, we are weeks away from the election, we're supporting over 150 candidates nationwide who are our top priority climate champions this cycle. So that's what we're doing and excited to talk about it.
Cody Simms (00:06:49):
And Caroline, you all are primarily focused on state and local races, is that correct?
Caroline Spears (00:06:55):
Yes. The way I describe where we are in the ballot is we hang out at Public Service Commission below. So you want to talk about the Pennsylvania State Senate District 37. I got you. That's what we're here for. And we're here to talk about what an important race that is for actually solving climate change, not just on a national scale, but also in an international scale. Some of our states are pretty big emitters on the international side.
Cody Simms (00:07:16):
Awesome. I can't wait to learn from you. And particularly a lot of these areas that you are focused on are things that maybe don't make the national news and yet can be so important for driving policy and pushing policy in good or bad places in test bed states that maybe boil up to becoming federal policy someday. So I can't wait to hear more Eliza say hi.
Eliza Nemser (00:07:36):
Hi, I am so glad to be here with all of you Cody and Caroline and Tiernan. I am Eliza Nemser. I am the executive director and a co-founder of Climate Changemakers. We are really a robust ecosystem for civic engagement on climate, which includes resources and includes thriving, growing community, a network of climate advocates across the country who really mean business and want to take meaningful productive action to advance climate policy at all levels of government. And as we all know, policy starts at the polls.
Cody Simms (00:08:12):
So for regular listeners of the show have probably heard me mention Climate Changemakers a few times because I'm also with Eliza, a co-founder of the organization. It's very much Eliza's organization. She runs it day in day out, but she and I, along with a few other people, had the crazy idea to start that thing back in the 2020 election cycle. And here we are four years later and it's a cranking organization. So excited to have you on as well, Eliza to learn from you. And the way I would describe Climate Changemakers is it's all about, okay, how do I actually roll up my sleeves as a constituent and get involved and do stuff?
(00:08:44):
What are the things I can do that's productive? So let's start. We're going to dive into a few different areas from the federal level all the way down to things at the local level that matter in this in a big way. But I want to start by just painting the broad picture of what's at stake for climate change. As we said, Tiernan, a lot happened in the last four years. We made a ton of progress on positive policy for climate change at the federal level. What's at stake in this cycle?
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:09:11):
Well, I'm happy to jump in there. Literally when it comes to climate and environmental justice and clean energy, everything is at stake. Truly everything is on the line. We saw the Trump administration, which was the most anti-climate, anti-environmental administration ever. Obviously they were horrific across the board, maybe including and especially on climate rolling back more than a hundred common sense environmental protection, things like embarrassingly getting out of the Paris climate agreement, reapproving, the dirty and dangerous Keystone, XL, tar sands pipeline. The list goes on and on more drilling off our coasts. And we've seen what Trump has promised to big oil, whether it's that if they raise him a billion dollars that can do whatever they want, that he wants to be a dictator starting on day one. So he can drill, drill, drill. And if you contrast that with the Biden-Harris administration, which is the most pro-climate by far, the Inflation Reduction Act, which we've already touched on and we should do early and often in this conversation if you ask me.
(00:10:03):
But 370 billion in climate solutions and clean energy and environmental justice that is truly super charging our clean energy economy. Yet we see Republicans in Congress trying to roll that back week after week. We know that Trump wants to do that. We could talk a little bit because now increasingly some Republicans in Congress are realizing it's not in their interest even as they're voting to gut it into repeal it. They're saying, oh, wait a second. This is creating jobs in my district. This is bringing clean energy investments to my district. So all of that progress is on the line at a time when we obviously have to keep moving forward. As Vice President Harris says, we have to ensure that all people in this country are free to breathe clean air, to drink clean water, to live in healthy climate. So we could not be more fired up and focused on all the progress that we have to make over the next 67 days.
Cody Simms (00:10:52):
Eliza, Caroline, anything to add there?
Caroline Spears (00:10:54):
So what I love about the people here right now is that there are two things you have to do to win on climate. You have to build the political window, you have to put the right people in office to pass the bill, and then you have to do the lobbying side of getting the bill through. And if you don't start with that first piece, your life is hard, if not impossible on the second. And so the folks on this call are all about how do we win climate majorities that actually create the space to even pass a policy, even have a conversation in the first place. So when I think about someone like the Arizona State legislature right now, so I got into politics actually from the solar industry and I worked for a utility scale solar developer. We built 60 projects in Massachusetts and none in the state of Arizona.
(00:11:39):
And you do not need a PhD. in climate science. You don't have to go get your degree in this to know that there's something wrong there. And the problem is policy. And specifically in this case, the problem is state policy. So you can have the best idea in the world, you can have the most common sense idea in the world. You can have the best economic argument in the world. And if you take it to the Arizona State legislature today with that leadership, it will die in committee. It will not get through. They are not interested in actually building out the clean energy economy. So we have to change leadership and that's what this next two months is about. It's about changing the leadership so that we even have the possibility of passing these things in the future.
(00:12:15):
I started Climate Cabinet about five years ago. If we break open the Arizona solar market, that will be a win. This has been on my mind for five years and we have about 60 days and we have a big shot and a big opportunity. And if we get super close this year, we will come back in two years. We are just a few seats away from getting that solar pro-climate majority in the air state, in the state legislature. It is within our grasp and that's what these next two plus months are all about.
Eliza Nemser (00:12:40):
I'll pile on there. I think they're exactly right. What we need to do is advance climate policies at all levels of government. And what that takes is climate leadership. We want to elect to climate leaders every chance we get. We also need more climate leadership in civil society. We need more climate leadership, climate advocacy, writ large amongst ourselves, our networks, and of course our lawmakers. And I think this election, there's an ongoing opportunity to become that climate advocate, that climate leader in your community. This election provides this really acute opportunity to jump in and recognize your own agency and leadership potential here. So the need for climate leadership doesn't end with the folks on the ballot. We all have a responsibility to contribute to that.
Cody Simms (00:13:33):
So I'm hearing from the three of you, Tiernan, advocating for you need majorities in major bodies of government that care about climate change so that climate policies can get passed. And if you don't have those majorities, there's the potential that things move backward. I'm hearing from Caroline at the individual state level, sometimes no matter how good of ideas a senator in that state may have or a federally elected official, it doesn't matter when it comes down to getting things done in that state. Because if the local State House of Representatives or whatnot doesn't want to do anything, you're blocked from making progress there locally, especially in a state like Arizona that has lots of sun and hot temperatures and could be a wonderful place for utility grade solar as an example, but isn't making progress. And then Eliza advocating for each one of us has an opportunity to be a leader in our local communities. An election cycle oftentimes is an activation point for people to start getting involved and doing things and that can feed into the future. Am I hearing each of your takeaways correctly?
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:14:34):
You're definitely hearing that correctly I think from me, and I couldn't agree more that it takes all of that. I mean, clearly that climate crisis is one of epic proportions. It is not some distant threat. The deadly and devastating impacts that we're seeing today, the floods, the fires, the storms, the record heat, we have got to keep making progress. And so we truly have to throw everything that we possibly can at it. And where I started in terms of the presidential election, where we've never seen a greater contrast when it comes to climate than we do between the Harris-Walz ticket and the Trump-Vance ticket. But as you know, we really have to have a real trifecta, a pro-climate, pro-environment, pro-democracy trifecta. So we have to win back the house. We have to have Speaker Jeffries running the show. And we have to not just defend, but expand the majority in the Senate so that we can really go back on offense.
Cody Simms (00:15:23):
I don't think on this conversation today we need to spend a lot of time on presidential politics. I think most people have a pretty good sense of where the two presidential sides of the ticket sit with respect to clean energy policy and whatnot. They've both been pretty clear about it. But I want to talk about the House and the Senate when we start with federal and understand what's at stake and what's important there. So if we could maybe begin with the Senate where I know it's currently a 50/50 Senate essentially, so very much in the balance and there are more, I think democratic seats up for challenger elections this cycle than Republican ones. Explain a bit about how you think the Senate might go and where anyone listening should be thinking about getting involved if they want to dig in on that Senate race site Last cycle, when we started Climate Changemakers, getting to that 50/50 Senate was the reason we started the organization. And here we are. It's up for grabs again.
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:16:18):
And kudos to you all and to everyone who helped make that happen. Had we not won the two Senate seats in Georgia with Ossoff and Warnock, we would not have the Inflation Reduction Act as the biggest investment we've ever made in climate. Eliza, do you want to start first with the Senate and I can follow up?
Eliza Nemser (00:16:32):
Sure. So we do have a number of highly competitive Senate races that are very, very deserving of a lot of a attention right now. So at Climate Changemakers we focus on the Venn diagram overlap between competitive races and races where there is a true climate candidate on the ballot. So to inform the competitive races, we can look at the Cook report. So it's a trusted third-party race analyst. To figure out where we have a climate candidate on the ballot. At the federal level in particular, we can look to GiveGreen, where we can find LCV and NRDC action fund endorsed climate candidates. So what does that mean for the Senate?
(00:17:15):
That means Jacky Rosen in Nevada, that means John Tester in Montana, that means Elissa Slotkin in Michigan. That means Sherrod Brown in Ohio. The list isn't that much longer. Ruben Gallego in Arizona, Bob Casey in Pennsylvania and Tammy Baldwin in Wisconsin. That is the totality of the lean or toss-up races with a climate champion on the ballot. So that's pretty no-brainer. Again, it's really easy to grasp the no-Brainer stuff. Those are no-Brainer, very competitive senate races. Tiernan, go ahead.
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:17:52):
Can I add a couple more?
Eliza Nemser (00:17:54):
Add more.
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:17:55):
I absolutely agree with you. We are all in at LCV Action Fund. Very proud to endorse them doing everything we can to help make sure that they win and they're going to be amazing next senators. But we also do want to expand the map. And so Colin Allred, who's currently in the house in Texas, is running for Senate against Ted Cruz, who is terrible across the board when it comes to the environment and climate change in particular. So we would love to have Senator Allred would love to help him win. He's also on GiveGreen. In Texas we are all in to help Debbie Mucarsel Powell. Don't disagree that these are tougher states, but we really want to expand that majority so that we can make even more progress. And there are going to be some amazing new senators who are in less competitive states perhaps, but people like Andy Kim and Lisa Blunt Rochester respectively in the House in New Jersey and Delaware who are very likely to be in the Senate and are going to be awesome new champions.
Cody Simms (00:18:46):
Of the races that you mentioned, and Eliza in particular, you went through one, two, three, four, five, six, seven races of which five are incumbent races, two of them I think are new people running, Slotkin in Michigan and Gallego in Arizona. They're replacing currently retiring or senators who are stepping down in Stabenow and Sinema. But the other five, these are active sitting senators in a 50/50 Senate whose seats are at risk. It seems like a big deal. And you've got Manchin who also is no longer there and West Virginia is almost certainly going to go to the Republican side. It seems like a tough task.
PART 1 OF 4 ENDS [00:19:04]
Eliza Nemser (00:19:20):
You're exactly right. And 100% plus, plus to everyone Tiernan described. All of these races are critically important. Again, just calling attention to literally the analysis where Cook Report, toss up and lean meets climate candidate, that might be the starting point. And in fact, let's just be straight a month ago I would've said we're going to be lucky if we can focus on those seven races and win it, and we still will be and we are going to need to work really hard. Things have changed, the dynamics have changed and absolutely the races that Tiernan mentioned feel like a bigger part of the conversation now given recent momentum.
Cody Simms (00:19:58):
So this is where the top of the ticket switch from Biden to Harris and the increased enthusiasm amongst the Democratic Party for Harris that we're seeing in the polls then cascades to driving enthusiasm in these local Senate races. Is that the dynamic that you're seeing happen here?
Eliza Nemser (00:20:13):
We sure hope.
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:20:14):
Yeah, I definitely think so, and I think that's partly reflected in why we saw Chuck Schumer, who very much needs to stay as the majority leader in the Senate, again, hopefully with a bigger pro-climate majority, people were joking that he was dancing his way up to the podium at the DNC convention, which I was lucky to attend last week. But the five incumbents who are in very tough races, the most tough races across the country that Eliza mentioned, they have been there. They voted for the Inflation Reduction Act. They stand up against big oil and other polluters every day, and we have to do everything we can to help them get re-elected because the contrast between them and their opponents could not be more striking. These are really, really anti-environmental scraping the bottom of the barrel candidates in many cases. So we need to be all in to help them both in terms of helping them have the resources that they need to win, ideally through GiveGreen, but also knocking on doors, making phone calls, talking to our networks, our family, our friends. These are going to be very close, and every vote counts.
Cody Simms (00:21:12):
What I'm hearing, reading between the lines of what the two of you're saying, Eliza, you're talking about this Venn diagram of candidates who are notably strong on climate and ones who are in tough races and Tiernan, you're saying, hey, you need a Democratic majority regardless if you want to push pro climate policy right now because the Republican Party has been obstinate on climate policy for the most part is what I'm hearing you say. How do you square that? Why does climate have to always be this political divided issue between parties? Do we get beyond that at some point in our lives? Sorry, this is not where I thought we would go with this conversation, but it feels like an unspoken thing we've got to talk about at some point.
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:21:49):
We definitely have to talk about it. It wasn't always that way. As I'm sure people know, our bedrock environmental laws were passed with overwhelming bipartisan majorities signed into law by a Republican president back in the '70s. The Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, the Safe Drinking Water Act, the Endangered Species Act.
Cody Simms (00:22:07):
Richard Nixon, I mean, let's say his name.
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:22:09):
Exactly. Who knew?
Cody Simms (00:22:12):
That's not who you would think of as the environmental champion out there, but here we go.
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:22:16):
And that tells you everything about what you need to know. That conservationism was initially very much a big part of the Republican Party and then we saw over time the incredibly corrosive really damaging role that fossil fuel interests and fossil fuel money has played in politics and in driving the Republican Party to this really extreme fringy place. And of course with the Koch brothers, with Citizens United having unlimited amounts of polluter money going into politics. And we always have known that we're never going to compete dollar for dollar, but we have facts on our side, we have science on our side, we have public support on our side. And so we have to fight smart and better and more effectively so that we can elect the right people, like Caroline and Eliza have been saying so that we can go back on offense and make the progress that all people in this country deserve.
Cody Simms (00:23:05):
Eliza, Caroline, anything you want to add on that on just the bipartisan, how do we get back to that when it comes to making progress in climate related policy?
Caroline Spears (00:23:13):
Nobody wants climate to be a partisan or political issue, but it is. I talk to people all the time who are like, but I wish that things were different and I wish things were different too, but we live in the world we live in. And so our job as a community is to stand in the world where we live currently and be tracking and be looking for signs of life. So every year we at Climate Cabinet support a few Republicans who are running and under the radar races or maybe not on CNN, but we support them because we can look at a track record. We can look at a voting record, it's always about the voting record. And every year we support Democrats running against Democrats who are not good on our issue either.
(00:23:49):
We have a democratic primary strategy as well. And those are two ways where we're not looking at partisanship first and foremost, we're looking at outcomes. And when you see the outcomes not just on, we can talk about their bad voting record, but let's also talk about building the clean energy economy. It is pathetic that Arizona has fewer solar jobs in the state of Massachusetts. That's not what we're working for. We're working for a growing economy that is supportive of people's lives and livelihoods in this industry. And so really I think it's easy because politics is so high octane to get stuck in the drama.
(00:24:25):
But really our job is to drill down and look into people's lives and say, what is the number of jobs we're creating for people? Can people go to work today and can they go to work for a solar industry? And it's about tracking the politicians who will help us get that done. And that's first and foremost, the strategy. And by and large, that is mostly Democrats. I think it's really easy to be like there are people on both sides. I'm like, yeah, there's 99 people on one side and there's one person on the other side. And it's important that we know who that person is and we're supporting that person, but it is lopsided. It's important to talk about that. I want to live in the world that I wish existed, but I live in the world we are today, and that's how I think about partisanship.
(00:24:59):
But looking for signs of life, always. Looking for opportunities to break that divide, always. And there are opportunities every year. We got people every year who do good votes that go against their partisanship or their party line or the phone call they got from the governor, you have to vote this way, and they vote their conscience and they vote pro climate anyway. And it's important that we know who those folks are and we support them.
Cody Simms (00:25:19):
I mean, the way I think about it is nobody wants wildfire smoke. Nobody wants their kids to breathe wildfire smoke. Nobody wants more tornadoes. Nobody wants their basement flooded. That feels like a thing everyone can agree on. It's just what are the causes of that and what are the ways to prevent that that there is misalignment on still.
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:25:38):
I think that's exactly right. I think the work that you're doing Caroline and that our state LCV partners do at the state and local level, there are more Republicans who absolutely want to engage in constructive solutions. I think unfortunately it's Republicans in Congress that are largely the outlier because people across the country, as you're saying Cody, they do want to breathe clean air and drink clean water and leave their children a healthier planet. So we will work with anyone and everyone who is serious about solutions, but I think getting serious about meaningful solutions is really of paramount importance.
Eliza Nemser (00:26:09):
And I'll add on, Tiernan's exactly right, I think a lot of Republicans in Congress are out of step with their voters on this issue. I think the two main things that come to mind for me are just toning down the partisan rhetoric writ large. Just in general leading with the issues is really going to help us all transcend the bickering and get to a place where we're aligning on common ground.
(00:26:29):
But the other is back to this engaged civil society and just we need more climate advocates, including Republicans. Absolutely. I was with one two nights ago and I asked him, you should be advocating. When's the last time you reached out to your state senators, staffers? They need to hear from you is a climate business leader who's Republican and just urging him to advocate. Folks need to hear that this is an important issue. They need to see it with the way folks are casting their vote, with the way folks are moving their money and they need to hear it from their constituents on advancing policy. So really just urging people who really are climate concern, no matter what their partisan identity is, to be active participants in government really as a constituent will move us really far.
(00:27:11):
And shout out to Benji Backer and his team, I feel we're remiss to not mention ACC and their role really trying to create a place for young climate concerned Republicans to move in and have a voice.
Cody Simms (00:27:23):
Benji's been on the show for anyone who wants to hear more about the work he's doing. He's pushing on the right side of politics as opposed to right versus left, not right versus wrong, the right side of politics to embrace climate related policies.
(00:27:35):
Eliza, I want to push on, you said even if you live in a Republican state you should be calling people. It almost feels even more so if you live in a Republican state, you should be calling people and helping them hear that these issues matter to people who live there.
Eliza Nemser (00:27:48):
Oh, 100%. I didn't say even if you live in a Republican state, folks need to hear from their constituents across the country, particularly those who were constituents or just feeling more fired up about climate action then it's just out of sync with the degree of leadership they're seeing. Absolutely. No, I urge everyone, republicans, democrats, any state you live in, no matter who represents you, I live in San Francisco and I'll advocate to my incredible climate champion leaders all the time because they're the only people who want to hear from me, they're the ones who represent me. So don't go advocate to someone who does not represent you, that's an important lesson on best practice and constituent advocacy. But even our greatest champions need to hear from their constituents all the time, and it needs to be ongoing, it needs to be ongoing, needs to be a habit.
Cody Simms (00:28:36):
All right, we're going to come to a bunch of things in terms of your advice for what should people be doing and how should they be doing that. But before we do, I want to come back to the electoral map that's right in front of us. We talked about the Senate. Let's talk about the House. What's at stake in the House with this cycle as it relates to climate?
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:28:52):
I'm happy to jump in. Everything once again is at stake. I don't mean to be hyperbolic, but truly the stakes have never been higher. The contrast has never been greater. The need for more progress has never been more important. So I think we always say this is the most important election of our lifetimes, but really this one is, and that applies to the House too. So we saw with the very narrow majority that then Speaker Pelosi was able to usher through the Inflation Reduction Act. It took a lot of work. It ended up being a compromise in some ways, and we have to make more progress. Which is part of why we need to get back to that trifecta.
(00:29:22):
We have seen with first Speaker McCarthy and then Speaker Johnson that they have gone after the Inflation Reduction Act dozens of times in committee and on the House floor. Fortunately, the combination of dysfunction and incompetence and infighting combined with the kowtowing to their fossil fuel allies has not resulted in them being able to do that. But that's because we've had the backs up of the Senate and we've had the Biden-Harris administration who of course would veto any actual attack that came to their desk. But we really have a very narrow majority. We need to win back at least four seats. We need to have Speaker Jeffries. There are definitely incumbent House Democrats who have been very, very strong on our issues. People like Gabe Vasquez in New Mexico. There are two great new members in Ohio, Greg Landsman and Emilia Sykes. Andrea Salinas in Oregon. I could go on and on. There's so many new members who are champions who are in tough races, so we definitely need to be all in to help them get reelected. And then there are a bunch of great candidates running in states across the country. Maybe in the interest of time, we could come back to them. I can kick it to Eliza.
Eliza Nemser (00:30:25):
No, I'll agree. It's a longer list in the House where again, that list of competitive races intersects with the list of climate champions. There's a lot of good ones.
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:30:35):
Including in your great state of California, people like Will Rollins in Southern California.
Cody Simms (00:30:40):
I was going to ask that, which some of the reading I've seen has said actually where the House is most up for grabs is actually in California and New York.
Eliza Nemser (00:30:46):
Well, there's a number of races. George Whitesides, who's a great climate champion, is running it in a district that this number is never going to leave my brain, he's running in a district that last time went by a margin of 333 votes. I think it's very important for your listeners to hear that number. These margins are so narrow. We're not messing around when we're saying these are competitive races. 333 votes. I mean, that's a true invitation. I hope that lands as an invitation because every single thing we do matters in these races. Yet it is a long list and that's when we can start to get into a conversation about nested races where your dollars and your volunteer time goes to help move forward climate champions at multiple levels of government who have this opportunity then to advance climate policy at multiple levels of government.
Cody Simms (00:31:40):
On the House side, just some civics 101 for folks, the House essentially is where legislation starts. So the House would be the one to, if there was going to be some attempt to repeal parts of the Inflation Reduction Act or whatnot, it would usually start in the House. The Senate owns the purse strings. They approve the budget and manage where money ultimately gets doled out. For folks who are listening and trying to think about where they might want to lean in, is that the right high-level way to think about it?
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:32:04):
Both for good and for bad legislation could start in both chambers, but certainly they both ultimately have to act on it and then it would have to be signed into law by the president. So we did see in the House in the previous Congress that the House acted first to pass, first Build Back Better, which was more sweeping, more comprehensive, included a lot of other priorities in the home, healthcare, Child Tax Credit, care space that unfortunately got cut out again, even though the Inflation Reduction Act was the biggest thing we've ever done on climate, it was very much a compromise in all kinds of ways. Then it took longer than we hoped because of Senator Manchin wanting it to shrink further before it finally passed the Senate and was passed into law.
(00:32:43):
So I would say for your listeners, we have to defend and expand the majority in the Senate and we have to take back the House. So I think it might just be a matter of are people really focused on a particular part of the country? Are they really focused on supporting candidates of color? Are they supportive or really most focused on people who have a state legislative background? And actually we have a lot of tools on our GiveGreen platform with NRDC Action Votes and LCV Action Fund that we can help people sort the candidates who they want to support the most and help them advise on how you can have the biggest impact because we know that dollars are limited and, like Eliza was saying, literally some of these races are going to be won by a very few votes and absolutely every one of those is going to count.
Yin Lu (00:33:28):
Hey everyone. I'm Yin, a partner at MCJ Collective here to take a quick minute to tell you about our MCJ membership community, which was born out of a collective thirst for peer-to-peer learning and doing that goes beyond just listening to the podcast.
(00:33:40):
We started in 2019 and have grown to thousands of members globally. Each week we're inspired by people who join with different backgrounds and points of view. What we all share is a deep curiosity to learn and a to action around ways to accelerate solutions to climate change. Some awesome initiatives have come out of the community. A number of founding teams have met, several nonprofits have been established, and a bunch of hiring has been done. Many early-stage investments have been made, as well as ongoing events and programming like monthly Women in Climate meetups, idea jam sessions for early-stage founders, Climate Book Club, art workshops and more.
(00:34:14):
Whether you've been in the climate space for a while or just embarking on your journey, having a community to support you is important. If you want to learn more, head over to MCJCollective.com and click on the members tab at the top. Thanks and enjoy the rest of the show.
Cody Simms (00:34:29):
I want to use this next question as an opportunity to move ourselves into state-level conversations for Caroline to explain a little bit about what's at stake. I want to do it by still starting at the federal level and then pivoting down, which is Texas. Giant pool of potential electoral votes. Caroline, you mentioned Allred versus Cruz. Is Texas shifting in a way that makes it move toward a more climate-oriented electorate?
Caroline Spears (00:34:56):
Yes, on two respects. I was at a Texas poll briefing yesterday. Okay, there are two things to think about when you think about Texas. There's the electoral map, the political window and the climate impact. Texas has more greenhouse gas emissions than the bottom 20 states combined. Combined. If you care about climate, you got to focus on Texas. I grew up in Houston. Everyone who knows that I'm from Texas knows that I'm always on the Texas train when it comes to climate. However, where people stop is the political math is really, really challenging.
Cody Simms (00:35:27):
Caroline, I was born in Texas too.
Caroline Spears (00:35:29):
Let's go. Where were you born?
Cody Simms (00:35:30):
San Antonio.
Caroline Spears (00:35:32):
I have family out in Kerrville, so we should talk about this later. Do you ever go back?
Cody Simms (00:35:35):
We moved to Kansas when I was six. My dad was in the Air Force, so I don't have any ties there anymore, but it's a lovely place.
Caroline Spears (00:35:41):
That's a classic Texas. If people are in Houston, it's oil. And Midland-Odessa, it's oil. And if they're in San Antonio it's military. My family's in Houston and Midland-Odessa because my family's in oil and gas, so I'm on the other two Texas economy cities, that's what I'm more familiar with.
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:35:57):
I want to hear about your Thanksgiving conversations sometime soon.
Caroline Spears (00:36:01):
Isn't it fun to have a Thanksgiving conversation right after an election? I got to be honest with you guys-
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:36:06):
Perfect timing.
Caroline Spears (00:36:08):
... I booked refundable tickets this year and we're just going to catch a vibe. But actually we're able to show up and have a lovely conversation and we talk about the rain and we talk about the cows and we talk about how the property's doing. It's great.
Cody Simms (00:36:20):
The conversation about having a conversation with your uncle at Thanksgiving that Tim Walz mentioned in his DNC speech, it hit home for me for sure. I'll just leave it there.
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:36:29):
My family fights about everything except for politics, basically.
Caroline Spears (00:36:33):
Cody, we're going to have to swap notes after Thanksgiving, or maybe we should do a pre-session.
Cody Simms (00:36:39):
All right. Back to you. Back to Texas.
Caroline Spears (00:36:41):
Back to Texas. Okay. There's a lot of love and a lot of disagreement, which is why Texas is so important. So okay, you've got the big climate impact, but also from what we've seen over the years is that margin in Texas, that political margin, is tightening year after year after year. Of course, it's tightening over a state with this huge population, so that's still a lot of people we got to reach and a lot of people we have to talk to. But a ton of climate potential and a lot of climate progress. We've seen the solar and wind build out there has been incredible and there's a lot of good economic things happening in Texas.
(00:37:13):
Every single cycle over the last three cycles of the Texas state legislature, they have tried to gut that progress. They have put all sorts of bills up that end up failing by just a few votes in the Texas Ledge, and these are votes that take all of the ancillary services costs and transfer them only onto solar plants. They do things like, one thing that folks are talking a lot about is people protesting wind and solar sites. They almost passed a bill last cycle that said you can protest all energy sites that are solar and wind only, and if you live within a certain mile of radius you're able to file an extra new environmental lawsuit that we've created. Does this apply to coal plants? No. Does it apply to the gas plants that the Texas ratepayers are now paying for on the grid? They're planning a huge gas expansion. They've created a government taxpayer-backed, low-interest loan fund to expand the gas capacity in the state because they know they're getting out-beat on the economics. Gas plants can no longer compete dollar to dollar in the state of Texas. And so you see the legislature toy with disrupting the progress that Texas has made.
PART 2 OF 4 ENDS [00:38:04]
Cody Simms (00:38:16):
On that note, though, you mentioned Texas has more greenhouse gas emissions than the bottom 20 states combined. Texas also has quite a bit of solar and wind production compared to what you said that was happening in Arizona, where it's basically blocked from development. Texas is actually quite aggressive on building out energy of all forms, I guess would be the way to describe it. Is that accurate?
Caroline Spears (00:38:34):
The way we describe it is they're on this great trajectory, and it's been on this great trajectory, but what we've seen in the last three cycles is the Texas legislature saying, "Should we slow down that trajectory? What if we allowed people to just sue wind and solar plants but over some environmental law that we're going to create just for clean energy." So you see people start flirting with that saying, "Should we curb some of this?" And that would have severe negative problems in the state on the economic front.
(00:39:01):
But they're interested because, as Tiernan mentioned, there's a lot of fossil fuel money in politics and that fossil fuel money is thinking about the bottom lines of their companies. After the Texas grid blackout, the CEO of a gas company that made a lot of money, made a million dollar single check donation to Governor Greg Abbott. That's the type of stuff we're working within the state.
Cody Simms (00:39:20):
Okay, so that's the Texas situation. You've mentioned Arizona. What other states are true bellwethers here that people should be paying attention to at the state level?
Caroline Spears (00:39:29):
Cody, I'm not going to really blow your mind here because it is still Pennsylvania, it is still Wisconsin, it is still Michigan. These are still top emitting states. Wisconsin is a smaller state in terms of population, a smaller state in terms of greenhouse gas emissions, it has twice the greenhouse gas emissions of Scotland. We are talking states that are multiples of other countries. We have a lot of climate opportunity at the table this cycle.
(00:39:52):
I actually just want to talk about one candidate, because we have 150 up and so that's going to get overwhelming. Let's talk about John McLean, who's running in Arizona State Senate District 17. This is our perfect climate candidate. He's running in the district.
Cody Simms (00:40:07):
Isn't John McLean the name of Bruce Willis in Die Hard? Am I crazy?
Caroline Spears (00:40:11):
You're not crazy.
Cody Simms (00:40:13):
Okay, just wanted to make sure.
Caroline Spears (00:40:14):
So you have some built-in name ID. Is it the same guy?
Cody Simms (00:40:16):
Which is a Christmas movie for the record.
Caroline Spears (00:40:19):
I'm going to let people in the comment section debate that. I'm going to leave that to the comment section of this website.
Cody Simms (00:40:24):
All right, John McLean, tell us all about John McLean and I will not say yippee-ki-yay. I won't do it.
Caroline Spears (00:40:30):
John McLean, not from Die Hard, also not John McCain from Arizona, different person. This is a guy he's running for the state legislature in Arizona. He personally installs heat pumps on his house. So if I'm thinking about people who are tuning into My Climate Journey, and maybe they've invested with you guys, they're investing in Arcadia, they're investing in Bolt, they're investing in WeaveGrid, and they're like, who are the politicians who were going to expand the market for what we can do on climate, the jobs we can recreate, this is the type of person you want to be supporting this year. That's the type of leadership you want from the State House to the White House, that's the type of people we need to keep in office. And so that's what we do is we identify these people early, and we get them elected.
(00:41:12):
We've been supporting John McLean, the candidate, for Arizona State Legislature for the last six to seven months. We're excited to continue supporting him. If you're based in Tucson, go knock doors for him. He's amazing. And it's not just John McLean. We have 18 other people we're supporting in the state of Arizona because we've got to get him the majority as well. And then we have 150 people across the country that, if they win, we'll control about a gigatonne per year of CO2 emissions.
(00:41:38):
So that's the scale that we're talking when we add all these candidates up, and John McLean is the type of person we support.
Cody Simms (00:41:44):
Where should people go to see your candidate slate if they want to follow up on some of these folks, if they live in these places?
Caroline Spears (00:41:50):
You absolutely should follow up on some of these folks. Also, what's exciting about these people is that your effort goes so much farther. A lot of people are going to Harris/Walz. That's good. We're thumbs up on that. That's great. She's obviously the better choice for president. But if you want to be the person who will knock the 100 doors that decides the margin in some of these races, you can go to climatecabinet.org. You can find all of these candidates, and you can support them in multiple ways, in multiple pathways through November 5th.
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:42:17):
Cody, can I make a plug for just a couple of governors? My state LCP partners would be probably quite upset at me if I didn't.
(00:42:24):
We have two outgoing, incredible climate champion governors in Washington state with Jay Inslee, who's definitely led the charge, maybe the earliest greenest governor in the country, though we're very happy that he has some competition now, and then Roy Cooper in North Carolina. Neither of them are running for reelection. So we really have to make sure that Josh Stein, who's the attorney general in North Carolina, becomes the next governor. His opponent, who's currently the lieutenant Governor is just, I don't have enough words for how terrible that would be for climate and basically all that we hold dear in the state of North Carolina. And then we need to make sure that Bob Ferguson becomes the next governor succeeding Jay Inslee in Washington State. Very big shoes to fill, which we're confident he will. But those races are real races and, obviously, having governors lead the charge at the state level is extremely important.
Cody Simms (00:43:11):
Super helpful. And on that note, and on the candidates you all have mentioned, Caroline, you mentioned where to go for the state candidates that you're supporting at climatecabinet.org. Tiernan and Eliza, before we move away from the individual candidate conversations here, do you want to share any lists or locations that people should go to see the list of candidates that each of you are endorsing or supporting?
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:43:29):
Well, I would love for people to go to givegreen.com where we have all of the candidates who we've mentioned and many others. And as I said, we are happy if people want to reach out to LCV. We can create a slate to meet any particular person's specifications or priorities, whether they're geographic or any other most vulnerable, biggest climate champs, most focused on clean water. You have a priority. We're there to work with you. But we have hundreds of candidates, including many at the state level on GiveGreen as well. And we are all in to help elect them and really appreciate helping them have the resources that they need to win and to know that those resources came to them from people who care so much about climate change and want them to wake up every day thinking what they're going to do to be part of the solution.
Cody Simms (00:44:13):
Tiernan, I know at least in the past, I don't know if you still do this, but you give candidates LCV scores, you actually rank them in terms of their forwardness on conservation policy, I suppose, which wouldn't be inclusive of climate policy. Would that be the way to think about it?
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:44:26):
Yes. Each year we have a broad cross-section of environmental and environmental justice leaders who come together to determine what were the most important votes that Congress cast on a wide set of issues. We've been very focused on climate today, but certainly clean air, clean water, public lands, endangered species, democracy, voting rights, even more, but I'll stop there, and then they get a score anywhere from zero to a hundred. Spoiler alert, unfortunately, in recent years there have been far too many Republicans who have a 0% score, meaning they vote against the environment and public health and climate progress, literally every single opportunity that they have.
(00:45:01):
So people can see how your members of congress, your senators are voting. You can actually write to let them know how you feel about that. It's on the LCV website, lcv.org/scorecard. And we're also happy to share a hard copy of the scorecard with anyone who writes to us to let us know they want that.
Cody Simms (00:45:17):
Eliza, anywhere you want to point folks?
Eliza Nemser (00:45:19):
Yeah, well, I'm also a huge GiveGreen fan. Have been for a long time. I think it is an incredible opportunity if you're going to be donating to support candidates to be metaphorically stamping that money, those dollars with climate concern. And it's also an invitation to participate in this community really of climate donors, and as a community, say we're pooling our resources together and moving those resources through GiveGreen in support of these candidates.
(00:45:50):
I think GiveGreen's a great resource. We have on our Climate Changemakers website a hub really, and we call it the Climate Vote Hub, and there you'll find a link to donate to candidates. You'll find a couple GiveGreen slates. We don't endorse candidates, we just lift up again, that Venn diagram overlap where the Cook Report is identifying competitive races, and GiveGreen is helping us identify the climate candidates. We also definitely encourage folks to give and support down ballot climate champions. You'll see at that same link a pass through to Climate Cabinet's priority slate, wildly important.
(00:46:27):
And the last thing I'll contribute is that I very much think we need to support candidates 100%, and campaigns come and go, and it's also very, very important to support longer term Get Out the Vote infrastructure that's being built by local grassroots organizations. So I like to tell people to think about really splitting their funding between candidates and supporting local grassroots organizations who are, again, building that longer-term infrastructure to support GOTV operations. And we have a link to do that too. We send folks through to Movement Voter Project. It's an incredible organization that does the work of really vetting and identifying quite effective grassroots organizations that are focused locally on Get Out the Vote Infrastructure.
Cody Simms (00:47:14):
Eliza, you have pivoted us to my next topic. Thank you. Which is going to be all about, okay, what if you have more money than time? What if you want to do is give, or even if you don't have a lot of money, but you want to give some of it, where should you go?
(00:47:27):
My first question, you started to talk about some of the Get Out the Vote organizations. I want to come back to that for sure. But when it comes to candidates, it's end of August when we're recording this, at what point is it too late? Should I still be giving to candidates now? Should I have done that six months ago, and now I should be shifting my dollars somewhere else? Where's the time horizon where money into actual candidates and/or campaigns is still effective?
Caroline Spears (00:47:53):
That's a great question. I think what you'll hear on this call is we're going to have three pathways of action for you. So everyone who's listening go to these three pathways of action. All of us are going to have different pathways through and they're all good. If someone's listening to this be like, well, I don't know which website to go to. Go to the first one you heard, or go to all three of them, and you're not going to end up on November 5th feeling bad. You're going to end up feeling great because you took one of these pathways of action to get there.
(00:48:19):
When it comes to time, value of money, this is really important. I'm going to start with the bad news and then end with the good news. At Climate Cabinet we did start supporting these candidates about a year ago, so the time to support candidates really is early, and you can get in on some of these races 12 to 14 months out. That's a fantastic time to be involved. And so I want everyone on this call, and I'm so sorry to do this, to be thinking about 2025. While you're thinking about 2024, use this moment to think about next year as well, because part of our goal is to help our candidates win.
(00:48:50):
And then part of the things that I track every year is I want to get involved in a race before the American Gas Association does. I love being in a race before the American Petroleum Institute has found it. And so, if you can donate early as a climate-informed citizen, you're sending a message that climate is there for the candidates at every step of the campaign trail. And that's incredible.
(00:49:08):
As soon as you hear this podcast, go support these candidates financially. You can sign up for their volunteer list if you want to go knock doors. That's also a great opportunity. And we're really right now at a point of every day you wait is diminishing marginal returns. So do it today.
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:49:24):
Well, I agree with you, that early is better and, in fact, EMILY's List, which works to elect pro-choice Democratic Women, the EMILY stands for early money, is like yeast because it helps campaigns grow and succeed. So that's great. We agree with that, but also these campaigns are very expensive to run. Some races, and we at LCV and GiveGreen are happy to advise on which candidates or which races really could use some resources in these final few weeks to be able to have a little bit more digital or a little more mail or another ad, not that you're supporting any specific thing, but just that they need more resources. So I think in some ways, while earlier is better, you can keep contributing all the way through, but also start to think about 2025, '26 and beyond.
(00:50:06):
And then we recruit our members at LCV through a Green Roots program to volunteer directly with campaigns. And what we really look for is where can it be a trifecta or an overlay of there's a great house member like Will Rollins in Southern California. Of course, then we're not really focusing on... we're very excited for a shift to be the next senator for Harris to win her home state, but perhaps Michigan is a better example where you're supporting a vulnerable house member like Hilary Skolton who's just finishing her first term. You're helping Alyssa Slotkin, who Eliza mentioned, who has been a great champ in the house. And then it's critically important that the Harris-Walz ticket win in Michigan. So where there's a three-fer?
(00:50:45):
But if you go to LCV's website, you can sign up to become an LCV member, and then you can volunteer through our Green Roots program, whether it's knocking on doors, making phone calls. If you live in a state that's not a swing state, you can make phone calls anywhere across the country. We have increasingly sophisticated systems. I was actually doing some calling last night with that Harris campaign, where you're doing it at your computer, or you're not dialing constantly, or it's not the old school kind of phone banking, and it's a lot of fun you can do with other people.
Cody Simms (00:51:11):
Awesome. We're going to come to the whole what if you have more time than money and what are the ways you can roll up your sleeves and really invest your own time in just a minute.
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:51:19):
Sorry, I'm just so excited about it.
Cody Simms (00:51:21):
No, you're good. But on the notion of where should your money go itself, we talked about giving to individual campaigns. You can also, as I understand, give to things like victory funds that spread the money out over multiple campaigns, including state races. You can give to a PAC as I understand it, which is independent from the campaigns and maybe running commercials and ads and things like that. Or you can give, as Eliza said, it sounds like, to different organizations that are not campaign necessarily affiliated, but that are driving Get Out the Vote efforts or driving some of these get involved efforts. Do any of you have a recommendation on how people might want to create their own personal list of how they prioritize their dollars?
Caroline Spears (00:52:00):
Yeah, the best way to get started is to get started. So pick one, set an initial budget for yourself, and I would start with giving to a PAC, a PAC that you trust. So you can give to Climate Cabinet, you can give to LCV. We've got multiple options here on this call today. Give to a PAC. What that's going to do is that's going to get you in the door, and then you'll get more and more information. It's all about taking the first step, and then how do you use that first step to actually gather more and more information.
(00:52:24):
In a way that Cody, for example, the history of my Climate Journey podcast, I think is a really great example of this. You were like, I'm going to start interviewing people, and now you're doing VC investments. It's a great foot in the door strategy. I think Cody and Eliza, y'all are both people who were really good at this and really good at explaining this to other people. But this would be the first thing for getting involved in the election is to get started. That's the best thing you can do.
(00:52:45):
So give to a PAC. What that's going to do is take your dollar and spread it out over the entire portfolio. At Climate Cabinet, what we do with PAC dollars is we spread it out across our entire portfolio of 150 candidates. So we're doing a lot of that decision-making for you. That's the first step. And some people love that. It's like a set it and forget it.
Cody Simms (00:53:01):
It's like investing in an index fund. It's like, oh, you want Nvidia, you want Facebook and Google, you can put your money in the top of this thing, and you'll get a little bit of all of it.
Caroline Spears (00:53:09):
I work with people every year who are like, I want to invest in the S&P 500 of climate politics. And so they give us the dollars, we give them a quarterly return, and we're like, "This is how it ended up. This is your return portfolio." So that's what investing in a PAC does.
(00:53:21):
And then from that you can pick specific candidates that you're excited about or interested in. There's a lot of great tools out there. At climatecabinet.org you can go and look for candidates that maybe are in your district or in your area or in a state you really care about.
(00:53:34):
We also have a link for folks who, say they want to invest in a candidate that also helps us win the presidential. Each one of our candidates, they may be running for state senate or state house or utility district or city council, they're going to reach a median of 30,000 voters just themselves over the course of the year. So there's a lot of impact at the state and local level, and that's how many voters each of these people will reach.
(00:53:55):
Those are some options for folks to just get started, and that's usually the progress I see people go through
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:54:00):
The limits for what any individual can give to a PAC are significantly lower than what someone could give to a C-4 advocacy organization or to a Super-PAC. So you might factor into your considerations, how much do you want to contribute? And you could consider multiple.
Cody Simms (00:54:16):
You've just gotten to the point where most people go, I don't know what to do. So why don't you quickly explain what is a Super-PAC, what does a C-4, what is a C-3, just for folks who really are getting into the weeds here and want to understand it?
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:54:28):
Oh, good.
Cody Simms (00:54:28):
I know none of you are federal election commission lawyers here, but it would probably be helpful just for anyone to understand some of these basic differences.
Caroline Spears (00:54:37):
Can you put that disclaimer; this is not legal advice?
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:54:41):
Yes, please disclaimer.
Cody Simms (00:54:43):
No one here is a lawyer.
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:54:46):
A C-3 is an education fund. It has absolutely nothing to do with politics or in a lot of cases, anything to do with advocacy. It is about educating the public, the public good, truly completely separate from politics.
(00:54:59):
A C- 4 is what the League of Conservation Voters is. And the advocacy that we do, making the case to members of Congress and to a presidential administration about all the progress that we need to make on all of our policy priorities, the National Environmental Scorecard is an accountability tool that is done through the C-4.
(00:55:17):
A PAC, I think Caroline described really well, which is an entity that is able to make contributions directly to candidates and to also do in-kind contributions for making an endorsement. And then a Super-PAC is something that I would say came about after Citizens United.
(00:55:34):
And I will say at LCV, we feel very strongly that we need to get big money and especially polluter money out of politics. And we're playing by the system as it exists, not as we wish it exists, but we absolutely support campaign finance reform. So that is an entity. A lot of the ads that people see on TV, either supporting candidates or opposing candidates, those often come through a victory fund or a Super-PAC.
(00:55:56):
But I would caveat everything that I said that I'm not a lawyer and any of you may want to change any of that. I'm also not sure this is, as you said, of wide interest and I probably wouldn't include it.
Cody Simms (00:56:06):
I think it's of super interest because it's confusing as crap if you don't work in this space, honestly.
Eliza Nemser (00:56:13):
No, I think that's right. And the one thing that I'd add that hasn't yet been articulated, is that if you make a contribution to a 501(c)(3), you get a tax deduction. And a lot of people like to get a tax deduction. If you give a contribution to a 501(c)(4), which as Tiernan mentioned, LCV is, Climate Changemakers is, Climate Cabinet Action is, you do not get a tax deduction. So that's an important distinction. When I talk to people who do want a tax deduction with some of their budget that they have set aside for this political cycle, there are definitely C-3s that you can support that are doing important GOTV work that is nonpartisan. So that is also an important option.
Cody Simms (00:56:53):
GOTV, Get Out the Vote.
Eliza Nemser (00:56:55):
Nonpartisan, Get Out the Vote, which means that there is no partisan messaging, no partisan targeting, but that is still really important in terms of getting out the vote. So, that's also an option, is to support some of those efforts.
PART 3 OF 4 ENDS [00:57:04]
Cody Simms (00:57:09):
And direct candidate or campaign giving, also not tax-deductible?
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:57:13):
Definitely not.
Cody Simms (00:57:22):
Okay, let's move into the what do I do if I want to get involved? If I have more time than money or maybe I have time and money and I have time and I want to use my time, what do I do? How do I get involved? Where do I dig in? It feels like this cycle's a bazillion Zoom. There's all these Zooms you can jump on where people are talking and then they ask you to do stuff, whether it's give money, like a telethon or engage on stuff. But where do I start? Eliza, I'm going to call on you for this one.
Eliza Nemser (00:57:49):
Well, I mean Caroline had it when she said that the best way to start is to start, and I'll take it further. Don't procrastinate. Don't put off to October what you could do in September. The other really important core element of this to hold is that you can 2X your impact, you can 10X your impact, you can 100X your impact when you engage your friends. So, where to start? I think that a lot of people wonder that. In fact, we have a Climate Changemakers Slack, someone joined today. Ella from San Jose, "I'm ready to do more than vote. I don't know where to start. Plug me in." The two things I would say is decision, fatigue can be overwhelming. Give yourself the gift of clarity and determine what you are going to do. That's key. And then the key is bringing a friend.
(00:58:38):
I think some people want the clarity before they loop in a friend. Like, all right, I'm in a canvas and I'm going to do five phone banks. I'm going to do this. Hey Mike, this is what I'm going to do. Will you do it with me? And I think some people are okay just being like, "Hey Mike, we got to do more than vote. Let's figure this out together." So, the order isn't important, but you need both. You need a plan and you need a buddy. I'll say that at Climate Changemakers, again, we have this hub, the Climate Vote Hub. If you go to climatechangemakers.org, click Featured Action, boom, you're there. We host an aggregated event calendar across the climate movement. So this includes events with LCV and the Harris campaign and Sunrise, you name it. Anything climate flavored and fully action oriented will end up on our aggregated event calendar. So, really excited to host that as a resource for people who want to again, be participating in climate flavored events.
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:59:31):
I love climate flavored events, Eliza. That sounds delicious.
Cody Simms (00:59:35):
What are these climate flavored events? I think of phone banking, I think of canvassing and door knocking, I think of letter writing. What are the things that people can do? Where do they get involved? What are the actions themselves?
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:59:47):
All of those. Those are all excellent activities and important in these final days and weeks. I think we're down to 67 days.
Cody Simms (00:59:55):
No, who's counting? Who's counting?
Eliza Nemser (00:59:57):
Who's counting?
Tiernan Sittenfeld (00:59:58):
How many hours?
Cody Simms (00:59:59):
Do we know that these things work? People, if they're going to take their time doing them, the results actually are there.
Eliza Nemser (01:00:05):
You have the 333 number, 333. I actually gave a talk the other night and I hit pause right in the middle of my talk and I handed out nonpartisan vote forward letters from a Vote Forward Campaign. They're one of our partners. They really have great data showing the efficacy of letter writing, voter to voter, and I literally hit pause, I gave everyone a letter. We all spent five minutes, "Here's why I vote and here's why you should vote." Five minutes later, we had a stack of 40 letters.
(01:00:33):
I mean, this stuff is easy to knock out. 333 votes can be the margin. I mean these margins are narrow. So, every touch, every outreach to voters matters, absolutely. And person to person and put your heart into it, whether it's door-knocking, whether it's a note on a letter or a postcard, whether it's a phone call. But again, the most important layer is that all of this is more fun with friends and all of this is way more effective with friends. So that relational piece is very critically important. So, turn it into a party, host some friends to write the letters or join a Zoom. Whether it's new friends or old friends, doing this stuff in community is key.
Tiernan Sittenfeld (01:01:14):
Yeah, I couldn't agree more with Eliza. And we try to make it very easy at LCV through our Member Mobilization Program that we call GreenRoots, which people can sign up for on the LCV website. But then you can get on a Zoom where the computer is actually doing the dialing for you to make phone calls. You're seeing your friends on the Zoom. Maybe you have some snacks. Definitely snacks are key in all of this. But I would say if you know you love getting out in the fall foliage and knocking on doors with a couple friends, go canvassing. If you know you want to just make calls for a couple hours after work in the evenings, phone banking is for you; if you want to write letters. There's so many options, and like Eliza is saying, they are all so critically important and could truly be the difference in some of these races that are going to be so close.
Cody Simms (01:01:55):
How do you overcome someone saying, "I care about these issues, but oh my gosh, actually talking to some other voter and trying to convince them of why this matters, that sounds so scary"?
Eliza Nemser (01:02:05):
That's a great question. I mean, I would much rather be part of helping people change behavior and become more engaged than change people's minds. I'm going to shout out to Environmental Voter Project. Nathaniel and his team, they have a really interesting strategy where they reach out to self-identified environmentalists who are low propensity voters. I'll say we do a lot of partnering with EVP and those are my favorite phone banks because by and large, you're going to meet like-minded folks on the other end of the call who just haven't really made a habit out of voting. So yeah, I would say there's really important persuasion work to do. I mean, if you want to do that, please do. Their deep canvassing is wildly effective.
Cody Simms (01:02:44):
All of you high school debate people, you got a path.
Eliza Nemser (01:02:47):
There's a path where we're really just reminding people to get out and vote and actually not trying to change their minds.
Tiernan Sittenfeld (01:02:53):
And you don't have to be an expert in climate policy or in how the government works or have to have done anything before. I think what is motivating to people, even a stranger, is seeing that someone else is taking time out of their day or their evening to have this conversation. They care so deeply this is why they think it's important. So, just connecting person by person can really be so impactful.
Caroline Spears (01:03:15):
I think people get overwhelmed, but when you simplify it, there's one sentence that is going to sound really obvious, but it's all about the sentence. Go talk to voters who vote. If you are on FiveThirtyEight, you are not talking to voters who vote. If you were stress reading the Google News alerts, you were not talking to voters who vote. There's the efficacy of all of these pieces has been tried and tested. If you want to read more, there's a great science-backed book called Get Out the Vote by Green and Gerber. That is one of the bibles out there, and you can literally go through all of the types of voter contact and it will show you the efficacy of every single one. At this point, the field's kind of that that A/B testing really is embedded within all of these programs. And it means the other corollary of talk to voters who vote is the closer you are to that voter, the more effective you are.
(01:04:01):
So, door knocking is more effective than phone banking, for example. This is all too intuitive. I don't want people to get lost in the tactics and be like, "There's so many options." It's all intuitive. Eliza mentioned relational organizing. That's even better than door knocking because it's someone you know reaching out to you saying, "Hey, have you registered to vote?" The closer you are to the voter, the more persuasive you are. And that means if you're at their door, you're much more persuasive than you're on the phone. But if you're on the phone, you're still doing a good job. If you're texting, you're still doing a good job, you're doing stuff. But the way to think about all of your actions is what do I have time for? What do I like doing? What's the most effective? And the only role you need to remember on what's most effective is how close are you to the person who needs to vote differently or at all usually?
Cody Simms (01:04:43):
It's such a good reminder. People can be persuaded, being persuaded by a politician who's very far away from you and whatever. Some people are going to love that and they're going to fall in love with what that person's saying, but having someone show up that you can relate to and you're like, "I actually like that human. I want to listen to what they have to say. I enjoyed meeting that person." It's a very different experience.
Eliza Nemser (01:05:03):
I totally agree with Caroline. If you find yourself doom scrolling, we really need to re-orient ourselves towards action. Every single one of us knows someone who will probably vote, might volunteer, might volunteer three times, maybe won't at all, but we could be the person that reaches out to them and pulls them in. And so I even feel weird having this conversation with you all without pausing to take action, so I'm going to commit, because I thought about this on my walk this morning. I've got a friend Mike. I know Mike's going to vote. I think that Mike has volunteered in previous cycles he's busy now. He's a school administrator. I'm going to text Mike. I'm going to ask Mike what his plan is and if I can help get Mike plugged in and I'm going to invite each of you to think of that one person in your network just like, "Hey, what are your plans for this election cycle? Do you need help figuring out how to get plugged in? Can we get you plugged in?"
(01:05:53):
I want everyone listening to do the same. Who's that one person that is a real candidate to volunteer to do more than vote and might not unless I nudge them? Because I think the one thing I want to add is that I mentioned Ella who joined our Slack today. I can't wait to respond to her when I get off here. We can answer that question for folks, but your listeners can also answer that question for folks. There are a lot of folks with this question, so having listened to this conversation today, I hope everyone will say, "Wait, I can help answer this question for the people around me who are looking for a way to do more than vote."
Tiernan Sittenfeld (01:06:28):
It's like Michelle Obama said last week, "Do something."
Cody Simms (01:06:31):
It's such a good reminder too. What I'm hearing all of you say, Caroline and I don't need to worry about that awkward Thanksgiving conversation we know we're going to have and trying to convince and change that person's mind. It's all the other people we know who we know probably think similar to us, but just we don't know for sure they're going to get up off the couch and go do something. Get them involved. That's what I'm hearing you all say.
Caroline Spears (01:06:51):
Yeah, I'm not spending any time. There's books on global cooling. I know who I am not going to try to convince from here until November 5th because the book on global cooling will get brought out and we've all been down that pathway before. Actually Eliza, I love that framing. It's, I'm going to text my friend Charles. He's like working through his vote. He lives about an hour and a half outside of Anna Payne's district, which is one of the top Pennsylvania house districts in the whole state. This is like the hold the Pennsylvania House.
(01:07:16):
Charles, what are you doing the weekend of October 12th? Let's go. We're going to go knock doors. And then instead of trying to convince my one uncle who, I love him, but neither of us is going to have a fun time in that conversation and nothing will get resolved, and that will not be a fun Thanksgiving. I'm not going to have that conversation at Thanksgiving. We're just going to go talk to voters who need to vote for Anna Payne. We're going to get Anna Payne elected on November 5th. We'll talk to 50 people who are like, "I've never heard of Anna Payne. Tell me more about her." And that's how these conversations are going to go down.
Cody Simms (01:07:42):
For folks who have actual time to spend on November 3rd, 4th, 5th, and then even after the election, what should people do on those critical days? What are things that can happen right then that matter?
Tiernan Sittenfeld (01:07:54):
People can still be going and knocking on doors, making sure that people are getting to the polls. There are ways that you can actually help people get to the polls. You can still be phone banking. I think it depends if you have the whole day off, you could go do voter protection work and you can actually volunteer as a poll worker. There's some training involved in that, but there's lots of different options, and now is the time to make a plan.
Eliza Nemser (01:08:15):
Totally. Yes to all that. And you can also give folks rides. There's people who really just need rides.
Cody Simms (01:08:21):
All right, last question. We've covered so much ground. I'm so appreciative to all three of you. If you could wave a magic wand and help all of this feel easier for people so that they know where to go, they know what to do, they feel empowered. What about the world we live in could get simpler to help people be civically engaged?
Eliza Nemser (01:08:44):
I would love everyone to know that the Yale Center for Climate Change Communications polls the American public, and in their most recent report on this 2024 found that 28% of Americans that they polled would probably or definitely take political action on climate... 2% are actively engaged. I want everyone to think about that 26%. We all know folks who are in that group. I want people to really internalize that and help equip those people to recognize their agency as climate advocates and their role in advancing climate solutions through civic participation. And again, I really would love, we've rolled out the welcome mat at Climate Changemakers with an invitation to get involved. We have 100% action focused events. We call them Hours of Action. We've been doing them almost every single week for four years, almost every day of the week online and in person. And they're an opportunity to bring a friend and show them what productive action looks like, tastes like, feels like, and what results you get.
Cody Simms (01:09:58):
I love it. Anything else we should have covered today?
Tiernan Sittenfeld (01:10:01):
Cody, you're such a good interviewer. I think you've hit on all the important questions and topics.
Cody Simms (01:10:06):
Well, it's a big meaty topic. Hopefully it's been helpful to folks. Thanks to each of you for explaining ways that people can get involved and hopefully it's been helpful for folks. I guess my recommendation for everyone is, if you enjoyed this episode, share it with a friend and then think about what your action plan is. Back to Caroline's point and Eliza's point and Tiernan's point, the best thing to do is to do something and to get started. The best way to give money is to start giving money. The best way to get involved is to start getting involved. Hopefully there are more resources than possible and it's not fatigue of choice you've found something here that sounded interesting, go click onto that. Go visit that website and start with that thing. Whatever sticks in your mind from this call, hopefully.
(01:10:48):
That's where I will leave it at because it is important that we all act in our civic duty. We're blessed to live in a democracy. How do we take advantage of it and fight for the things we all care about? So, Tiernan, Eliza, Caroline, thank you so much for the work that each of you do and your organizations do, and all the people that you work with do and all the volunteers who engage with you do. For everyone listening, thanks for hopefully deciding to get involved and let's make things happen.
Tiernan Sittenfeld (01:11:12):
Let's go win. Thank you all so much.
Eliza Nemser (01:11:15):
Thanks, Cody.
Caroline Spears (01:11:17):
Go team. Thanks. It was super fun.
Jason Jacobs (01:11:20):
Thanks again for joining us on My Climate Journey podcast. At MCJ Collective, we're all about powering collective innovation for climate solutions by breaking down silos and unleashing problem solving capacity. If you'd like to learn more about MCJ Collective, visit us at MCJcollective.com. And if you have a guest suggestion, let us know that via Twitter @mcjpod.
Yin Lu (01:11:46):
For weekly climate op eds jobs, community events, and investment announcements from our MCJ Venture funds, be sure to subscribe to our newsletter on our website.
Cody Simms (01:11:56):
Thanks and see you next episode.