Climate

All people in our country should live in communities where they are able to breathe clean air, drink clean water, and have a safe, healthy, stable place to live.

Our Position

We affirm what Pope Francis has warned: climate change and other environmental degradation, especially by wealthy nations like the U.S., threaten the entire world’s population.

Issues

NETWORK Advocates for Federal Policies That:

Invest in Clean Energy, Air and Water and End Incentives for Fossil Fuel Corporation

Pope Francis has warned that climate change and environmental degradations--especially those precipitated by wealthy nations like the U.S.--threaten the entire world. Fossil fuels (coal, oil, and gas) are the largest contributors to global climate change, but the wealthy companies responsible for polluting the environment often pose obstacles to harm reduction and cleaner energy alternatives. It seems as though they place revenues and profits over the common good and use their political influence to retain the status quo.

Wealthy fuel companies have a track record of pushing disinformation campaigns and concocting false or misleading climate solutions in the U.S. and abroad. It’s time to cut the billions of dollars in federal tax breaks and subsidies that they receive, at the expense of the U.S. and the world, and invest in critical initiatives that mitigate and reduce the negative effects of fossil fuels. Sound and responsible climate policies must be wholistic spanning across issue areas like education, housing, infrastructure, and health care.

Invest in Cleaning Up the Legacy of Disproportionate Environment Harm in Black and Brown Neighborhoods

While we are all impacted by climate change, its harms fall disproportionately on Black and Latino communities, who are least able to prepare for, and recover from, extreme heat, flooding, and poor air quality.

Systemic racism, in the form of historic redlining, allowed heavy industry to cluster in Black and Latino neighborhoods, resulting in toxic exposure that persists today. Black people are exposed to 38 percent more polluted air and are nearly four times as likely to die from exposure to pollution than White people.

Children in communities of color and in low-income urban areas are more likely to be exposed to lead from paint and aging water systems, which can lead to catastrophic health consequences, as happened in Flint, Michigan in 2014.

How You Can Help

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Our Wins

The Biden-Harris administration has required a minimum wage of $15/hour for federal contractors’ workers and increased the number of workers eligible for overtime protections.
The Inflation Reduction Act, Bipartisan Infrastructure Act, and CHIPS Act created 14 million new, good-paying union jobs, including 800,000 jobs in manufacturing and 210,000 in clean energy.
The American Rescue Plan Act provided temporary paid leave and increased and expanded childcare tax credits, increasing hard-working parents’ time and ability to care for their children.
Win: The Biden Administration’s EPA issued dozens of rules reversing Trump Administration relaxations of environmental protections including: finalizing the strongest-ever pollution standards for cars and passenger trucks, updating national air-quality standards to significantly reduce the level of air pollution from particulate matter, strengthening regulatory limits on toxins, and limiting mercury pollution, a water supply toxin that is especially harmful to pregnant women
Win: The Department of Interior announced the largest offshore wind lease sale in American history
On Biden’s first day in office, the US rejoined the Paris Agreement, an international agreement to avert catastrophic climate change by cutting emissions.
The Infrastructure Act funds critically important climate initiatives, including electric vehicle charging stations, clean electric buses, community resilience against natural disasters, lead pipe replacement, and oil well cleanup.