Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez put a racial spin Wednesday on climate change and hurricanes, attributing emissions from “predominantly white” corporations and communities for juicing recent storms that cost “predominantly black and brown lives” in Louisiana and Puerto Rico.
Even as House Republicans argued that cheap electricity from fossil fuels has helped lift more than a billion people out of poverty around the world, the New York Democrat asked a witness about whether “the Global South and communities of color” bear the brunt of climate “havoc.”
“[T]he people that are producing climate change, the folks that are responsible for the largest amount of emissions, or communities, or corporations, they tend to be predominantly white, correct?” she asked at a hearing of the House Oversight and Government Reform subcommittee on civil rights and civil liberties.
The National Wildlife Federation’s Mustafa Ali replied that “yes, and every study backs that up I know no one is intentionally trying to kill people and hurt people.”
“My own grandfather died in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria,” said Ms. Ocasio-Cortez, referring to the 2017 Puerto Rico storm that ultimately left about 3,000 dead. “We can’t act as though the inertia and history of colonization doesn’t [sic] play a role in this.”
Rep. Chip Roy, Texas Republican, pointed out that the deadliest hurricane in North American history remains the 1900 Great Galveston Storm, which killed between 6,000 and 12,000 people, making landfall well before the rise of atmospheric carbon-dioxide emissions.
What’s more, he said, low-income communities will be the hardest hit if climate change initiatives like Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s proposed ban on hydraulic fracturing are enacted.
“Let’s talk about the massive violation of civil liberties that will occur if we do as Elizabeth Warren has said, and ban fracking,” said Mr. Roy.
“Let’s crush the American economy and crush the jobs not only in Texas but around the United States, and ban fracking in a fit of hysteria, undermining the very civil liberties of the Americans that depend on that affordable and available abundant energy.”
#ICYMI: Watch @RepChipRoy’s opening statement from today’s subcommittee hearing examining climate change. https://t.co/dKOGgnUC7N
— Oversight Committee Republicans (@GOPoversight) October 23, 2019
The hearing was timed to the start of the ExxonMobil “climate fraud” trial in New York, which began as a probe into what Exxon “knew” decades ago about climate change but morphed into an accounting dispute over the company’s use of two sets of numbers to gauge the “proxy cost” of carbon and climate regulations.
“The purpose of this hearing seems to be to stir up a media frenzy and provide a storyline for the current court case in New York, a case that isn’t even about allegedly covering up the truth about climate change anymore, but about accounting disagreements,” said Mr. Roy.
Subcommittee Chairman Jamie Raskin argued that “Exxon knew decades ago that climate change was real and would have devastating consequences if left corrected,” but instead “publicly denied the reality of climate change” by engaging in an “extensive and sinister campaign of climate denial.”
“The people have been denied the power knowledge gives, which means they have been governed by Big Oil,” said Mr. Raskin, Maryland Democrat.
Today at 10 AM Civil Rights and Civil Liberties Subcommittee Chair @RepRaskin will examine how the oil industry’s climate denial campaign has affected people of color and vulnerable populations in our country and around the world. https://t.co/XAgMIVCbZC pic.twitter.com/C5tQURH5yR
— Oversight Committee (@OversightDems) October 23, 2019
Former Exxon consultant Martin Hoffert said the company “deliberately created doubt” about the seriousness of climate change that contradicted its internal research, adding that, “as a result, homes and livelihoods will likely be destroyed and lives lost.”
In questions to Mr. Hoffert and former Exxon scientist Ed Garvey, Rep. James Comer, Kentucky Republican, established that Exxon’s climate research was widely published and in line with what other researchers were saying at the time about global warming.
“The New York attorney general and many other leading climate-change litigation efforts across the country would have us believe that the oil-and-gas industry hid key science for decades from the American public,” said Mr. Comer.
“Publishing work that is consistent with academic research in scientific journals seems like an odd way to go about hiding anything.”
Global climate-related deaths — those from floods, hurricanes, drought, wildfires, and other “extreme weather” events — plummeted by about 95% from 1920-2018, according to data compiled by the Copenhagen Consensus Center’s Bjorn Lomborg.
Rep. Thomas Massie, Kentucky Republican, said he knows from first-hand experience that moving to 100% renewable energy in the near future, as Ms. Ocasio-Cortez has called for in her Green New Deal, would be expensive, particularly for the disadvantaged.
“For the record, I’m not against solar, I’m not against electric cars,” Mr. Massie said. “I drive an electric car and my house is 100% solar. But I estimate that I pay about twice the cost for transportation and electricity, so this is not a burden we should put on low-income communities.”
Read more at Washington Times
These trials may be a good thing. When these climate-alarmists take the witness stand they can be properly cross-examined by the defense. They can’t avoid answering questions as they do by avoiding publicly debating their hysteria. The country should watch closely.
What AOC is ignorant of is that the cheapest land in a valley is the bottom land because it is on the biannual flood plain. Is it any wonder that flooding hits the lower income people more? Duh. But, it could also be argued that the low income people use their fair share of energy as best they can and also have emissions. How is it possible to blame one specific segment of the population for what they do when everyone else is doing the same to the best of their abilities?
AOC is playing race wars, big time.
These lawsuits on Global Warming/Climate Change are based upon Junk Science and Politics its all about some crooked Lawfirm and some city officials lining their pockets and fattening their bank accounts with some ill gotten cash this whole Global Warming/Climate Change is a scam and one of the biggist scams since the Garden of Eden and the Forbbiden Fruit
This girl is still a naïve child, and an under achiever, another rhetorical clown with spinach for brains. It speaks volumes of the morons that elected her. I’d be having a field day on twitter, but, they suspend people for speaking their opinions, while they let clowns like her and Swallowell say anything they like, inflaming the rest of us onto suspension. We need a new platform for normal people.
Well said! ( This site doesn’t use “likes” )
Would AO-C buy a house near the Obama’s new digs in Martha’s Vineyard ? Or maybe a home in New Orleans, below sea level?
When can we expect the mandatory evacuations? Colored, women and children . Whitey gotta go down with the ship.
AOC such a joker . Guaranteed she is already looking for her next landing spot .
I’m betting CNN or MSNBC . She needs to cash in big in the next few years .
I can only say that idiots are a waste of time and we should not be giving them air time. let them have Twitter.
“[T]he people that are producing climate change, the folks that are responsible for the largest amount of emissions, or communities, or corporations, they tend to be predominantly white, correct?” she asked at a hearing of the House Oversight and Government Reform subcommittee on civil rights and civil liberties.
The National Wildlife Federation’s Mustafa Ali replied that “yes, and every study backs that up I know no one is intentionally trying to kill people and hurt people.”
The largest emitters are Chinese and Indian. I don’t think she considers them “white”
China is the worlds #1 Polluter Asia and Africa produce the most plastic wastes America is still the cleanist nation no matter what you see or hear from the M.S. Media
Always scream
RACISM
to automatically ” win ” any argument that you’d
otherwise automatically lose due to lack of :
Cite worthy evidence and
Logical rhetorical presentation.
Jaypee, I agree. There is more than winning auguements involved. Liberals are hypersentive on racism (don’t get me wrong, I don’t think discrimination is good). Therefore if anything can be labeled racist that is immediate justification for any extreme action that they want.
However, non-whites are just like whites. They drive cars, heat and aircondition their homes, and work at places that use energy. In addition, Spurwing Plover has an excellent point. I didn’t know that China’s population is white. This does point out something obvious about the eco-extremist. Those in the US act as if our nation is the only one controlling world wide emissions.