Greenies And Democrats At Each Other’s Throats As Climate Change Talking Point Evaporates

The Sierra Club is calling for a local Democratic representative to be dismissed from his role on a key committee, which the Democratic Massachusetts House Speaker panned as a “foolish.”

State-level Democratic Massachusetts Rep. Mark Cusack, who chairs the state’s House Committee on Telecommunications, Utilities, and Energy, was reportedly planning to soften the state’s climate mandates and cut some funding for a green program, according to the CommonWealth Beacon. The local Sierra Club executive committee chapter then unanimously voted for Cusack to be removed as chair in a first-ever move for the chapter, outraged at the purported effort to “walk back the state’s landmark clean energy laws,” according to the local publication and Sierra Club.

“With this foolish request, the Massachusetts Sierra Club is demonstrating a complete lack of understanding of the legislative process, and is simply overreacting to old news stories about an outdated committee redraft of the House’s energy affordability legislation,” Massachusetts House Speaker Ron Mariano told the CommonWealth Beacon. “Just last week, [Ways and Means] Chairman Michlewitz and Chairman Cusack hosted several member meetings regarding this bill and are now working to incorporate the feedback that they received. For months now, the House has been clear that this legislation will not alter the state’s climate goals or retreat from our commitment to clean energy. Instead, our sole focus is on bringing down energy costs for residents, a goal that everyone should be capable of supporting.”

Cusack did not respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.

As an energy affordability bill moves through the Massachusetts legislature, the Sierra Club is opposing language hostile to the state’s climate goals, though the CommonWealth Beacon wrote that this language is not likely to remain in the final bill-.

A Sierra Club spokesman told the DCNF that the reported plan to water down climate goals “is one part of a complex and comprehensive bill to charge ratepayers more money for electricity and gas by vastly expanding our gas distribution system which is the main driver of high costs. … Two other reasons we are calling for this are the inappropriate, rushed, and nontransparent process he [Cusack] used to try to move the bill out of committee without having public hearings for these issues, and that he took fossil fuel donations almost exactly as the bill was released.”

The CommonWealth Beacon reported that Cusack raked in over $2,000 from energy interest groups around the same time the plan was made public. However, according to the publication, it is unlikely Mariano will remove Cusack from the committee, and two environmentalists from other local organizations said they are unsure what impact his removal would have and are concerned the Sierra Club’s action could backfire.

Affordability is set to be a major Democrat talking point heading into the midterm election season, while some Gallup polling indicates that climate change is fading from voters’ minds. Several Democrats have marketed green energy initiatives as keys to affordability, a point also touted by the Sierra Club.

Critics of this view contend that these green policies disturb energy markets, shut down reliable power supply and drive industry out of the state, causing costs to climb. Notably, Democrats in other states including New York have recently moved to punt their climate goals over affordability concerns and several congressional Democrats have pivoted from climate change messaging and refrained from mentioning the “Green New Deal,” once widely championed by their political party.

Massachusetts has set ambitious climate targets, planning to achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 and to slash emissions by at least 50% of 1990 levels by 2030.

The publication noted that some climate advocates distanced themselves from the Sierra Club’s move, saying that they are instead “encouraging interested people to keep engaging with all House members.”