[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 4 (Wednesday, January 8, 2014)]
[House]
[Page H27]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          SAFE CLIMATE CAUCUS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from New 
Jersey (Mr. Holt) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. HOLT. Mr. Speaker, I rise today as a member of the Safe Climate 
Caucus.
  After 12 months of the 113th Congress, Republicans continue to push 
their anticlean energy, antienvironment, climate-denying agenda. 
Although we have taken very few votes in this Congress over the past 
year, we have taken more than 100 votes that are antienvironment. Those 
included:
  20 votes that would weaken the Clean Air Act;
  20 votes that would prevent Federal efforts to curb greenhouse gas 
carbon pollution;
  51 votes to protect oil and gas special interests;
  37 votes to weaken the Clean Water Act;
  27 votes to slash funding for clean energy and energy efficiency.
  I don't enjoy pointing out that protecting our air and our water has 
become a partisan issue, but I must point out that Republicans are 
still sacrificing the climate and our environment for the benefit of a 
few wealthy special interests.
  It is cold outside today in much of the U.S., and some are saying 
that this is proof that global warming is a hoax. How misinformed that 
is. The cold wave in the midlatitudes of North America is a result of 
warm patches in the oceans and the atmosphere diverting the jet stream 
and driving arctic air southward.
  Climate change doesn't mean warmer air everywhere, every day. It 
means more fluctuations, in other words, droughts, storms, and 
temperature changes. They are--and will be--greater.
  It is going to be warmer tomorrow and the next day and for the next 
100 years, on average, until we get serious that this is the most 
pressing environmental threat on our planet--global climate change.
  The way we produce and use energy is the greatest insult to our 
planet, not only causing injury and death through pollution, but 
adversely changing the world's climate with very dangerous, deadly 
results.
  We should support the President's climate action plan.

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