Rhetoric on EPA, Climate Show Divisions Among Republican Presidential Hopefuls

One likely Republican presidential candidate called the Environmental Protection Agency “locusts” while another compared climate change to a “sunburn,” exposing a contrast with several other likely contenders within the party who recently acknowledged the role of human activity in climate change.

National Republicans almost universally have opposed President Barack Obama's plan for addressing climate change and how he has used the EPA to achieve those goals, but Senate votes the week of Jan. 19 showed some acknowledge the problem is real even if they disagree about how to address it.  Those divisions are slight but important as Republicans consider a 2016 presidential nominee, environmental advocates have said.

Sen. Ted Cruz, a first-term senator from Texas, spoke Jan. 24 at the Iowa Freedom Summit of the need to send “the locusts of the EPA back to Washington” just days after he voted against the scientific consensus that human activity significantly contributes to climate change.

“I was once out in west Texas, and I said, ‘You know, the thing about folks from the EPA is, unlike locusts, you can't use pesticide against them' and an old farmer looked at me and said ‘Wanna bet?'” Cruz said.

While most Republicans have expressed concern about the magnitude and substance of many EPA regulations, few have used such fiery rhetoric about the agency.  Recent polling found six in 10 Americans back limits on carbon pollution, including half of all Republicans, although respondents were not asked how to do so.

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