[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 192 (Tuesday, November 10, 2020)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6633-S6634]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                             CLIMATE CHANGE

  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Madam President, as I begin my remarks, let me thank 
my friend Senator Lankford for his eloquent comments about our veterans 
and those who have served and given their lives for us.
  I am here with my trusty and battered ``Time to Wake up'' graphic 
because, after 4 dark years on climate, there is at last a glimmer of 
light on the horizon.
  President-Elect Biden has promised to redirect the executive branch 
to address climate change in the clear light of real science, out of 
the dark swamp of fossil fuel denial and obstruction, trying--trying--
to head off a climate catastrophe while there is still time, if there 
is still time.
  There is a lot the executive branch can do. The President can lead 
diplomatic and international trade initiatives. The environmental 
regulatory agencies of government can be freed from corrupting 
influence to do their duty with vigor based on science and the law. 
Securities regulators can put climate risk to the economy at the 
forefront, as the Commodity Futures Trading Commission has just done. 
Purchasing decisions can be directed toward a clean energy future. 
Permitting decisions can be made with the social cost of carbon 
pollution in mind, as courts have already begun to demand even in the 
corrupt Trump era.
  On the investigative side, the administration can begin a hard look 
at the forces of corruption that have blockaded action on climate 
change: Who did this and how? Did their political spending violate 
campaign finance, conflict of interest, or other laws? Did their toxic 
propaganda violate laws against fraud, as the tobacco industry's did? 
Was their occupation of regulatory agencies a rolling conspiracy to 
violate the Administrative Procedures Act, and if so, how and for whom 
was it organized? Has their interference in the judiciary compromised 
the rights of parties or the integrity of courts?
  American citizens deserve a full and fearless exposition of why 
Congress has thwarted the public will to do something--anything--
meaningful to address this climate crisis and at whose behest.
  What were the forces of corruption, and how did they accomplish their 
nefarious purpose? There is a lesson in democracy here for the citizens 
of this great Republic--a lesson that is now hidden behind phony front 
groups and subterranean rivers of anonymous money. There is every 
reason to believe that the biggest covert op in history has been run in 
and against our own government. That is no way for a ``city on a hill'' 
to be governed.
  But with all the executive branch policy work and all the 
investigations that are due and overdue, there is no pathway to climate 
safety that does not go through Congress. Action by Congress is a 
necessity, not a luxury. I have seen no study showing any pathway to 
safety without action by Congress.

  To make that pathway to safety possible, we will have to change a few 
things. One is, as I said, to investigate the denial and obstruction 
campaign run by the fossil fuel industry, how it used its dark weaponry 
of political spending--much of it anonymous--and political propaganda. 
The executive branch can do this, but so can the House. Sadly, here in 
the Senate, the power of the fossil fuel industry assures no such 
investigation will happen in our committees if Republicans keep control 
of the Senate. But the House or a high-level Presidential commission or 
our Department of Justice all have tools to bring the light of 
transparency into these dark and slimy corners.
  Separately, we can display to the American people what corporate 
America says about climate change versus what it does in Congress. It 
may even surprise some CEOs what their corporate lobbying posture 
actually is. If you are a CEO who is sincere about this, you ought to 
commission an audit of your corporate lobbying and electioneering on 
climate. Here is what you will find, unless you are maybe Patagonia or 
Ben & Jerry's: Most every major American corporation does nothing in 
Congress on climate--zip, zero, nada.
  TechNet lobbies for the supposedly climate-friendly Silicon Valley 
giants like Apple, Google, Facebook, and Microsoft. It even represents 
green energy companies. Yet this year its glossy, 13-page menu of 
priorities for Congress never even mentioned climate change or green 
energy.
  Coke and Pepsi lobby Congress through an American Beverage 
Association that doesn't lift a finger on climate. That corporate 
behemoth, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce--three times the lobbying muscle 
of its next nearest rival, sometimes the biggest dark-money spender in 
elections, a persistent voice in our courts and regulatory agencies--
that chamber is in a statistical tie for America's worst climate 
obstructer--worst.
  Representing Ford and GM, Abbott Labs and Johnson & Johnson, Citibank 
and Bank of America, Delta and United, Target and Home Depot, Intel and 
AT&T, and dozens of other big businesses is a worst climate obstructer 
in America. That deserves some explaining.
  Don't just blame Congress. By doing nothing, Congress is exactly 
following what corporate America actually asks of Congress: Do nothing. 
Do nothing. We don't care.
  Want to open a pathway for a safe climate through Congress? 
Republicans in Congress are going to have to hear that their corporate 
benefactors demand climate action. They aren't hearing that now. They 
are hearing the opposite. They are hearing: We don't care.
  Democrats are ready. We have been ready for a decade. Republicans, at 
least since Citizens United--it was quite bipartisan before that 
decision--won't touch the issue, and by an amazing coincidence, that 
party is almost entirely funded by the unlimited and often anonymous 
donations of the fossil fuel industry. The money is often hidden, of 
course, behind donor trusts and shell corporations and 501(c)(4) tax 
organizations, but it is there, and it is billions.
  The rest of corporate America has not pushed back. They have their 
own tax breaks to protect and their own industry priorities to pursue, 
and climate change just doesn't make it into their corporate political 
agenda. Getting the so-called good guys off the bench and onto the 
field could make a big difference, but they are not there now--not yet.
  If corporations are going to fail this moral test so 
catastrophically, it is fair to ask what good it does to give 
corporations any role in our politics, let alone the commanding role 
they now assert in the U.S. Congress. The Founding Fathers, for one, 
would be astonished to see these monsters loose in our politics at all, 
let alone so large and in charge.

[[Page S6634]]

  But that is for another day. Right now, there is a lot President-
Elect Biden can do to break the political logjam fossil fuel money has 
built: Investigate it, expose it, and then overwhelm it. Recruit allies 
to help push back hard. Give no audience or corner to corporations 
funding climate obstruction. Make lobbying groups disclose who their 
big donors are so the American citizen isn't played for a chump--the 
mark in a giant con game.
  If you don't think big American industries are capable of committing 
massive fraud, read the decision of the Federal judge in the fraud case 
the United States won against Big Tobacco for that scheme of lies or 
read the decision of the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upholding her 
verdict. It took investigation to get to the truth, not politics. 
Indeed, investigation had to pierce through a fog of industry politics 
and lies. But at the end of the day and, more specifically, at the end 
of the investigation, the truth was out, and the truth was massive 
industry fraud
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. INHOFE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. INHOFE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that I be 
recognized as if in morning business for such time as I shall consume.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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