In an effort to make Senate Republicans look out of step with the U.S. electorate, Democrats forced a vote on an amendment to the Keystone XL pipeline bill that would make Republicans publically state whether they believed climate change was a man-made event.
In an obviously politically motivated effort, the vote was pushed forward to determine “who the climate-change deniers in the U.S. Senate really are,” said Chuck Schumer (D-NY) prior to the vote. “Do they deny that human activity has helped create climate change? Stay tuned -- we’ll see.”
The Senate rejected the amendment with a vote of 50-49. Five Republicans voted for the amendment. They included Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire, Susan Collins of Maine, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Mark Kirk of Illinois. No Democrats in the Senate broke ranks to vote against the amendment.
“Obviously, it’s a very politically motivated vote,” said Senator John Thune (R-SD). “They would love to get a bunch of Republicans voting against those amendments.”
A counter amendment was proposed by Senator John Hoeven (R-ND), the primary sponsor of the Keystone XL pipeline bill that said that although human activities could influence climate change, the contribution was not “significant.” That amendment was defeated, as well.
Although climate change is high on the list for Democrat fund-raising efforts, along with the website discountrue, it was not a successful election strategy for 2014. Billionaire environmentalist and political contributor Tom Steyer’s super pac used climate change to hammer at candidate Corey Gardner in Colorado. Gardner defeated incumbent Senator Mark Udall, a Democrat, in that race.
The results from the maneuvering in the Senate had Republicans acknowledging that climate change is real but refusing to say that humans are to blame for it. Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) summed it up his stance by saying that climate change is real and it is largely man-made, but the solutions being pushed by the Democrats are bad for the economy.
According to Senator Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) the fight over climate change, “is unfolding exactly the way a lot of us wanted because we wanted to have finally a debate and see where the chips fall. And where the chips fall is we’re making progress.”