09.21.16

Grijalva: GOP Full Committee Hearing Today “Another in a Long Line of Time-Wasting Climate Denial Theater Productions”

Washington, D.C. – Ranking Member Raúl M. Grijalva dismissed today’s Committee hearing at 10:00 a.m. Eastern time on White House climate change guidance to federal agencies as “another in a long line of time-wasting climate denial theater productions.” Grijalva urged the Committee majority to end its habit of calling climate hearings to promote discredited views and repeat industry talking points.

“Everyone involved knows this is about sending a partisan signal to industry allies and climate denial funders, not making better policy,” Grijalva said. “According to Gallup, American concern about climate change is at an eight-year high. Republicans holding yet another hearing about why the scientific community and the public at large are wrong about climate change and oil companies are right frankly disrespects the public’s intelligence, not to mention the legislative process.”

As far back as May 2015, in a similar hearing, Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) compared a climate denier witness to Galileo for his supposed scientific courage; Rep. Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.) observed that “I emit greenhouse gases” and that it is “perhaps impossible to measure [. . .] how much our emissions actually contribute to global warming”; Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska) dismissed concerns about “so-called global warming”; Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) said “climate change has been happening without man for forever”; Rep. John Fleming (R-La.) said that concerns about climate change are based entirely on “voodoo science”; Rep. Dan Benishek (R-Mich.) suggested eliminating air pollution standards, as they have done in China, would be good for the U.S. economy; and Rep. Bruce Westerman (R-Ark.) said it was “obviously debatable” whether carbon pollution is the greatest driver of climate change, among other similar remarks.

You can see the video highlights of that hearing at http://bit.ly/1FeRO4k.

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