Audrey Streb
DCNF Energy Reporter
The Sierra Club is calling for a local Democratic representative to be dismissed from his role on a key committee, which the Democratic Massachusetts House Speaker panned as a “foolish.”
State-level Democratic Massachusetts Rep. Mark Cusack, who chairs the state’s House Committee on Telecommunications, Utilities, and Energy, was reportedly planning to soften the state’s climate mandates and cut some funding for a green program, according to the CommonWealth Beacon. The local Sierra Club executive committee chapter then unanimously voted for Cusack to be removed as chair in a first-ever move for the chapter, outraged at the purported effort to “walk back the state’s landmark clean energy laws,” according to the local publication and Sierra Club.
“With this foolish request, the Massachusetts Sierra Club is demonstrating a complete lack of understanding of the legislative process, and is simply overreacting to old news stories about an outdated committee redraft of the House’s energy affordability legislation,” Massachusetts House Speaker Ron Mariano told the CommonWealth Beacon. “Just last week, [Ways and Means] Chairman Michlewitz and Chairman Cusack hosted several member meetings regarding this bill and are now working to incorporate the feedback that they received. For months now, the House has been clear that this legislation will not alter the state’s climate goals or retreat from our commitment to clean energy. Instead, our sole focus is on bringing down energy costs for residents, a goal that everyone should be capable of supporting.” (RELATED: Top Dog At Sierra Club Jettisoned After Staff Revolt)
Cusack did not respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.
As an energy affordability bill moves through the Massachusetts legislature, the Sierra Club is opposing language hostile to the state’s climate goals, though the CommonWealth Beacon wrote that this language is not likely to remain in the final bill-.
A Sierra Club spokesman told the DCNF that the reported plan to water down climate goals “is one part of a complex and comprehensive bill to charge ratepayers more money for electricity and gas by vastly expanding our gas distribution system which is the main driver of high costs. … Two other reasons we are calling for this are the inappropriate, rushed, and nontransparent process he [Cusack] used to try to move the bill out of committee without having public hearings for these issues, and that he took fossil fuel donations almost exactly as the bill was released.”
The CommonWealth Beacon reported that Cusack raked in over $2,000 from energy interest groups around the same time the plan was made public. However, according to the publication, it is unlikely Mariano will remove Cusack from the committee, and two environmentalists from other local organizations said they are unsure what impact his removal would have and are concerned the Sierra Club’s action could backfire.
Affordability is set to be a major Democrat talking point heading into the midterm election season, while some Gallup polling indicates that climate change is fading from voters’ minds. Several Democrats have marketed green energy initiatives as keys to affordability, a point also touted by the Sierra Club.
Critics of this view contend that these green policies disturb energy markets, shut down reliable power supply and drive industry out of the state, causing costs to climb. Notably, Democrats in other states including New York have recently moved to punt their climate goals over affordability concerns and several congressional Democrats have pivoted from climate change messaging and refrained from mentioning the “Green New Deal,” once widely championed by their political party.
Massachusetts has set ambitious climate targets, planning to achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 and to slash emissions by at least 50% of 1990 levels by 2030.
The publication noted that some climate advocates distanced themselves from the Sierra Club’s move, saying that they are instead “encouraging interested people to keep engaging with all House members.”
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Can Democrat Governors Ignoring Global Realities, that Cling to “Green” Policies, explain how wind turbines or solar panels will make the more than 6,000 products in our daily lives that did not exist before the 1900’s, and the fuels to move the heavy-weight and long-range needs of more than 50,000 jets moving people and products, and more than 50,000 merchant ships for global trade flows, and the military and space program?
Can Democrat Governors … explain how
“technology will get better”
(i.e. magic)
Simply recognizing how bug f**k the Sierra Club is is a good start.
Oh really? The two things are mutually exclusive. But anyway, the bickering, backpedaling and infighting are symptoms of an ideology which is falling apart.
Not sure their ideology is falling apart, but it is a typical Commie circular firing squad. They eat their own. Always have.
The three most expensive states for electrical cost are Hawaii, California and Massachusetts. Hawaii is exorbitanty expensive because the island state must import all dispatchable power sources. California and Massachusetts have closed much of their dispatchable power sources, requiring imported power to keep the lights on. California has sufficient natural gas distribution for all people to cook their food and stay warm in the winter. Massachusetts foolishly blocked new pipelines would have allowed Bay State residents to stay warm in the winter without going into debt.
MA imports about 60% of its electricity.
David, where can I see a breakdown of that 60%? I read somewhere, probably on this site, that Quebec stopped its export of electricity, at least temporarily.
Isn’t what the Sierra club tries to do sedition? Lock them up, all of them.
Meanwhile at comedy central it’s the usual climate changer clown show with other people’s money-
https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/svg/1f921.svg Clown World! Yet ANOTHER electric bus DISASTER! | MGUY Australia
Too bad so sad
Claiming high electric rates are the fault of natural gas and coal is the standard lie of the Climate Alarmists.
Windmills and Solar are the real cause of higher electric rates.
You missed one item. Windmills, solar AND idiot politicians are the cause of higher electric rates.
I noticed that the Sierra Club staff is revolting.
And they smell bad,too…as per the old joke about the peasants revolting..
It’s not the staff, who are being purged. It’s the billionaire funders who want a more hardcore radical Club. They hate the USA and love Red China. Look for the Sierra Club to get violent and adopt terrorist tactics in the near future.
Meanwhile those same deep pocket globalists are buying farm and ranch land by the millions of acres here and across the globe. The are Feudalists at heart; Communism is just the new name for an old ideology.
Wow. “…Cusack raked in over $2,000 from energy interest groups… .” That is some real life-changing money to “rake in.”
It was needed to pay his power bill
The Left welcomes anyone who will vote for them. They feign agreement with their ideology as long as the symbiotic relationship exists. This is why the Left is not dominated by any single ideology and is fragmented and open to internecine disagreements.
When one strikes out often enough, he should realize that the game is beyond his capabilities and he should seek some other endeavor. The Greens and too many Democrats/progressives haven’t had this reality sink in yet even if they’re experiencing more and more resistance and opprobrium to their theories.