One of the first campaigns we launched at Moms Clean Air Force 12 years ago was working to get climate change issues into the presidential candidate debates. We wrote letters, Twitter-tagged, petitioned, made phone calls, and got nowhere. It just wasn’t considered an important enough subject.
Today, people across the country are experiencing the dangers of the extreme weather that is part of climate disruption. The wildfires. The floods. The high and unrelenting temperatures that make air pollution so much more dangerous.
And today, importantly, we have a President who has made fighting climate and air pollution a priority—across the entire government. It has made all the difference in the world.
I expect that President Biden will acknowledge the climate crisis, point to the progress we’re making thanks to his leadership, but also note that our work is not done. Just that simple acknowledgement would have been widely celebrated a few years ago. Today, we almost take it for granted. But there’s a fuller story of the progress to reverse decades of environmental harms.
Here’s my State of Clean Air:
When it comes to fighting the double whammy of air and climate pollution, the United States is in a far better place than it has ever been.
An amazing coalition of people—justice leaders, labor leaders, faith leaders, business leaders, health leaders, young people, moms, dads, grandparents, and caregivers—these people have helped us achieve the strongest health protections from climate and air pollution, and the largest investments in clean energy and clean transportation, that we have ever seen in this country.
And we have made historic progress in our efforts to win this battle.
We did it by harnessing the power of love. We don’t talk a lot about love in our political discourse, but we should. It is far stronger, far more productive, than hate. In fact, love is the most sustainable energy we have.
That means we harnessed the power of love in our fight against climate and air pollution, love for all that we cherish, all that is best about America. A love for our children, for our communities, for the places we hold dear, for faces we hold dear, for the future we are building.
A future built on solving problems, not denying them.
A future built on harnessing our engineering and technological excellence, for the good of everyone.
A future built on inventing new industries, creating new jobs that will sustain us now and for the next generation.
Don’t listen to people who say progress cannot happen. It is happening. Don’t listen to those who say that pollution can’t be solved without wrecking the economy. We are solving our problems and our economy is growing stronger and stronger.
Are we done yet? Not at all. In these four years, we have laid a strong foundation. In the next four years, we will build on that foundation. We will build better laws, better protections. We will build better transmissions lines, better power grids, better cars and trucks, better school buses, better sources of electricity.
I pledge to you that we will continue to clean up our air, to stop climate emissions, and to protect all the faces, and all the places, we so love.
My friends: I believe in justice in every breath. I believe that all people have the right to clean air and to a stable climate.
There is nothing we cannot accomplish when we set our hearts and minds and willpower to it. We can get this done.
TELL PRESIDENT BIDEN & EPA: MOVE QUICKLY TO FINALIZE STRONG POLLUTION PROTECTIONS