Susan Collins' Putative Green Credentials And Meaningless Votes Can't Mask Her Trump Support
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Collins can fairly argue that her environmental voting record hasn't changed much under Trump—her score on the League of Conservation Voters scorecard now hovers near her lifetime average of 61 percent substantially higher than that of any other current GOP Senate candidate. She voted against both Scott Pruitt and Andrew Wheeler when Trump nominated them to head the Environmental Protection Agency and opposed the rollback of the Obama administration's Clean Power Plan. But she supported many other Trump nominees opposed by environmentalists, including Kavanaugh, who has a record of skepticism about federal authority to regulate greenhouse gases.
In fact, Collins' environmental voting record has see-sawed. She previously won the LCV's endorsement both in 2008, when she was one of just three Senators with a perfect 100 percent on the league's scorecard, and in 2014, when she scored zero, casting votes in support of the Keystone XL oil pipeline and against clean energy tax credits.
Collins' supporters argue her record reflects that she is not beholden to party or ideology. "Despite which party controls the White House, Senator Collins has always taken a pragmatic, thoughtful approach to our climate – and has always sought to find common ground and forge compromise rather than focus on what might divide us," said her campaign spokesman, Kevin Kelley, in an email. Early in the Obama administration, Collins and Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) co-sponsored "cap-and-dividend" legislation as an alternative to the "cap-and-trade" bill then foundering in the Senate. It would have put a price on carbon, but less directly than a tax, while distributing the revenue in "dividend" checks to citizens to help offset increased energy costs.
But no big climate program ever made it through the Senate in the Obama years. And with Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) firmly opposed to economy-wide climate legislation, Collins has not pushed further. She did not sign on to a "cap-and-dividend" measure now before Congress that is similar to her own 2010 bill. In the current Congress, Collins has been a co-sponsor of bills prohibiting withdrawal from the Paris climate accord, calling on Congress and the president to act on climate, and supporting regional greenhouse gas reduction programs. All were dead on arrival in McConnell's Senate.
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https://insideclimatenews.org/news/18092020/senate-2020-maine-climate-change-susan-collins-sara-gideon
