It may be too early to draw conclusions, Book said, given that Harris is scheduled to deliver an acceptance speech in Chicago on Thursday evening. It remains unclear whether the environment will be a prominent theme in that address.
Interior Secretary Deb Haaland is also slated to speak at the convention on Thursday, and she is expected to mention clean-energy jobs created under the Biden-Harris administration, according to a person familiar with the programming who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the schedule is not public. Other speakers on Thursday include Rep. Maxwell Frost (D-Fla.), the youngest member of Congress, and John Russell, a content creator who is expected to talk about the energy transition.
Many major environmental groups, for their part, aren’t pressing Harris to spell out whether she’ll go further than Biden in limiting planet-warming emissions. On Monday, a coalition of environmental groups announced a $55 million advertising campaign in support of Harris, and the first three ads don’t explicitly mention climate change, focusing instead on the economy.
Trump has called climate change a “hoax,” and his administration weakened or wiped out more than 125 environmental rules and policies. In contrast, Harris has called global warming an “an existential threat to us as a species,” and the Biden-Harris administration has finalized the strongest-ever limits on emissions from cars and power plants.
“Vice President Harris was proud to fight for and cast the tie-breaking vote on the nation’s largest investment to tackle the climate crisis and create a clean energy economy — and is focused on a future where all Americans have access to clean air and clean water, and good-paying jobs,” Harris campaign spokesman Seth Schuster said in an emailed statement. He declined to preview the vice president’s acceptance speech.
During an economic speech on Friday in Raleigh, N.C., Harris referenced green energy in passing, saying the Biden administration has made “historic investments in infrastructure, in chips manufacturing, in clean energy.” She then returned to her populist economic agenda, including the “first-ever” ban on price-gouging for groceries and food.
Speakers at the Democratic National Convention have followed suit. Biden mentioned climate change twice in his keynote remarks on Monday, compared with six mentions of the economy and five mentions of “the border.” He did brag at length about the climate bill — the Inflation Reduction Act — that needed Harris’s tiebreaking vote, calling it “the most significant climate law in the history of mankind” aimed at “cutting carbon emissions in half by 2030.”
In rousing remarks on Tuesday, former president Barack Obama said Harris believes in “protecting the planet from climate change” toward the end of his speech. But he and former first lady Michelle Obama devoted a far greater share of their remarks to scathing rebukes of Trump.
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D), Harris’s running mate, said on Wednesday night that “when Republicans use the word freedom, they mean … corporations free to pollute your air and water.” But he largely used his speech to introduce himself on the national stage and to champion reproductive rights, an issue that has gotten far more air time at the convention.
Not all climate advocates endorse the Democrats’ approach. Stevie O’Hanlon, a spokeswoman for the Sunrise Movement, a climate group led by young people, said the party shouldn’t be afraid to discuss the issue head-on.
