How Does Hillary Match Up with Other Dems on Climate Change?

Clinton is by many definitions a climate hawk. Importantly, she has said the President’s use of the Clean Air Act to rein in carbon pollution from power plants, “must be protected at all costs” during a speech last year to the League of Conservation Voters.  She has been critical of fossil fuel subsidies and supported boosting renewables.  To her, climate change represents “the most consequential, urgent, sweeping collection of challenges we face as a nation and a world.”
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But in other areas, she falls short of that hawkish moniker.  She still advocates for domestic fossil fuel production, specifically natural gas, arguing it is cleaner than coal “with the right safeguards in place.”  She said enforcing smart regulations is important, “including deciding not to drill when the risks are too high.”  As Secretary of State, Clinton received criticism around the world for advocating global fossil fuel development, specifically fracking for shale gas in eastern Europe.  Her successor, climate hawk John Kerry, has stuck with this strategy, viewing natural gas as a tool to use for fighting climate change.  Clinton still frustrates greens refuses to comment on the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, the long and ongoing approval process for which she oversaw at the State Department.

So if a climate activist were still shopping around for a candidate, who else is there?

The shallow Democratic bench ranges from well-known figures that register in early polling like Vice President Joe Biden and Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren (who, respectively, have no formal political operation, and repeatedly insisted no desire to run), to more active potential candidates who are currently blips in the polls like former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), former Virginia Sen. Jim Webb, and Lincoln Chafee, a former Republican senator, independent Rhode Island governor, and current Democratic presidential primary exploratory committee former.

O’Malley
The two-term governor of Maryland may have low name recognition, barely registering in early polls.  But he has assembled a political team and visited early primary and caucus states several times in recent months (including six to Iowa since June).  His approach to a potential run for the Democratic nomination appears to be a populist one, providing progressives a viable option to progressives who are dissatisfied with Clinton.

O’Malley pushed Maryland to cut greenhouse gas emissions 25 percent by 2020 compared to 2006 levels, announcing a comprehensive plan to do so in 2013.  Last year, O’Malley vetoed a bill that would have effectively killed Maryland’s first big offshore wind project. 

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