Former vice president Joe Biden notched an endorsement from a major environmental group — and is signaling he will expand his climate plan in an effort to win over young voters who see rising global temperatures as a generational crisis.
The political arm of the League of Conservation Voters, a Washington-based green group that has spent tens of millions of dollars in recent election cycles to help elect Democrats to office, announced Monday that it is backing the presumptive Democratic nominee in what looks to be a tough fight against President Trump.
Drastically reducing greenhouse gas emissions “is going to take leadership,” said Carol Browner, the chair of LCV’s board of directors. “And I have every confidence that the vice president will provide that.”
The endorsement from the LCV could encourage other green groups who supported Biden’s rivals in a crowded primary to fall in line. The group hopes to prevent Trump, who has repeatedly denied the scientific consensus that human activity is warming the planet, from winning a second term.
“Scientists tell us we have 10 years” to get climate change under control, said Browner, who ran the Environmental Protection Agency for eight years under former president Bill Clinton. “We’re going to have to not just put back in place all the stuff that Trump undid from the Obama years, we’re going to have to do more.”
Biden said in a statement that he was “honored” to have the LCV’s endorsement. “For me, this is personal,” said Biden, a former senator from Delaware. “I live in a state that’s dealing first hand with the impacts of climate change and impacts of pollution on kids and families. I’m going to fight for my grandkids.”
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