James Connolly
The recently elected Republican majority led by Mitch McConnell (pictured below) has vowed to fight the EPA; forward the Keystone XL pipeline; and generally challenge President Barack Obama's capacity to address climate change. This blog will follow the battle with periodic postings and input from students in Northeastern University's environmental politics class.
The recently elected Republican majority led by Mitch McConnell (pictured below) has vowed to fight the EPA; forward the Keystone XL pipeline; and generally challenge President Barack Obama's capacity to address climate change. This blog will follow the battle with periodic postings and input from students in Northeastern University's environmental politics class.
According to the League of Conservation Voters' Environmental Scorecard, Congress was split in terms of historic support for environmental policy prior to the November 2014 elections. Relative to all Congresses since the 1970s, the Senate was on the high end of support for environmental policy (on average, voted in favor 57% of the time) and the house was slightly below average (on average voted in favor 43% of the time). |
With the president moving into his last term having made relatively small progress on environmental policy and with both houses of Congress majority Republican, will these percentages decline? Is there any ground where the two sides will come together? Future posts will explore this as the new Congress convenes. Already, it seems that the Keystone XL pipeline will be an immediate issue on the agenda.