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Elizabeth Warren 2020


Hugo Stiglitz

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Yep, big crowds. Liz is generating huge enthusiasm and I think the fact that her growth has been slow and not event-based (like a temporary bump off a debate stage gimmick) means that her base is durable and lasting.

Ideally, we have a primary contest between two hugely-popular-with-the-grassroots candidates who are just challenging each other to become better for the workers.

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Yep, plenty of opportunities for former public officials without a shady corporate payoff for peddling their influenced they gained while supposedly serving the public. Some will argue that this would create some kind of chilling effect on talented people entering public service. If slightly more limited ability to cash-in after serving is a reason not to pursue public service, then you have no reason to be in a public office. This is not that hard. 

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7 hours ago, Hugo Stiglitz said:

Texas town hall:  gives the story of her first senate run, why she ran, and how she won. 

She's a great storyteller. And comparing her on the stump today versus some of what she did in the lead up to 2016, she's taken things to a new level. Every bit of her heart's in this and it shows.

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4 hours ago, horncyclist said:

She's a great storyteller. And comparing her on the stump today versus some of what she did in the lead up to 2016, she's taken things to a new level. Every bit of her heart's in this and it shows.

Absolutely. Was just a little bit dusty in my house when I heard tell the story of her aunt, who called her and offered to move in to help w/ the kids so that Liz could simply work as a teacher.

 

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Why Elizabeth Warren is the one to watch

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/08/30/why-elizabeth-warren-is-one-watch/

By Rob Stutzman
August 30 at 4:11 PM

Rob Stutzman is a GOP political consultant in Sacramento.

Among the remaining contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination, it seems clear that Elizabeth Warren has so far made the most of 2019.

Several considerations support this conclusion. The Massachusetts senator has plodded upward in the polls, buoyed by solid debate performances and what seems to be an indomitable spirit. Her promise to forswear large donations and the private events that attract them led to smirks from establishment pros. But she has saved precious time by skipping those events and her tally — $19.1 million in the second quarter — has made her the small-donor rocket ship. Meanwhile, as the field narrows and as Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) proves that, in politics as in movies, the original act is almost always better than the sequel, Warren may soon benefit from a media narrative that prefers a two-person race.

But Warren is hitting her stride because of two other, more important, traits: style and substance. We’re used to politicians being good at one or the other; rarely do we see both.

Consider the Warren style: Chiefly, it’s fearless. She was the first candidate to call for President Trump’s impeachment (likely a key to her fundraising), and to invoke her oath and fidelity to the Constitution as the imperative to seek Trump’s removal from office. On the debate stage and at her rallies, she’s pugnacious and has modulated her voice to be emphatic without screaming. “I’m a fighter” is one of her slogans, and it’s a credible one, especially when she implores those in the audience to “get up off [their] butt and volunteer!” She just doesn’t just want to fight; she wants to lead a fight.

All this is catnip for many rank-and-file Democrats, but don’t discount the potential for her to attract moderates who are looking for someone who can go toe to toe with Trump on a debate stage. More than one Democratic voter has mused to me that Warren is the only candidate who sounds like she might chew Trump’s leg off onstage. It’s a vivid contrast to Joe Biden, who at times seems to be observing the debates as much as participating in them. If Democrats come to define electability as a measure of who can take on a bully, Warren’s stock will rise.

Warren’s substance, meanwhile, is her killer app. Her proposals range from an “ultra-millionaire tax” to breaking up big tech companies to forgiving student loans; the decision to flood the zone with big and bold substance has become definitional. And, in a race in which Sen. Kamala D. Harris (D-Calif.) has had more positions on health care than toppings on a supreme pizza, Warren has emerged as a candidate of deep convictions.

So can Warren win this nomination? Certainly. Does that leave the Democrats with a nominee who can beat Trump? That’s not so certain.

Trump thrives on opponents he can demonize and demagogue, and Warren would be dry tinder for his flamethrower. She has called for decriminalizing the border and providing health care to undocumented residents and Medicare-for-all, while her soak-the-rich world view is out of step with a majority of voters. All these pieces may provide Trump with a way to recast her as a risky choice; some of her Democratic rivals are already giving this tactic a dress rehearsal.

More broadly, there is a chance that Warren’s killer app could boomerang. A plan for everything? Even in politics, life isn’t that simple and most people know it. Trump has an uncanny way of turning his rivals’ strengths into debilitating weaknesses, and in his hands, in this strange era, her litany of policy proposals could become an object of ridicule and a rallying cry.

But if so, that’s still a ways down the road. When caucuses and primaries begin and ballots are cast, Warren may gain a momentum that lends her an aura of electability. It is already easy to imagine her as the nominee, moderating some of the policies that won her the left’s intellectual crush, reaching for a moderate counterweight, perhaps a general or a seasoned diplomat, as her running mate. Suburban voters who dumped the GOP in 2018 could find that an acceptable alternative to the man they now know isn’t the stable genius they might have imagined.

And if Medicare-for-all seems risky, it also seems unlikely ever to become law. Which might make Warren a risk worth taking.

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2 minutes ago, Doc Reeves said:

In my mind she is a very compelling opponent to Trump in that she (and some of her staff) have experienced him already and presumably have a plan to deal with him. 

Lets watch...

Wait- She might have a plan?

😁

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Before Politics, Elizabeth Warren Gained a Following With a Personal Finance Book

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-08-30/elizabeth-warren-once-wrote-a-book-on-how-to-get-rich

A few years out of college, Sarah Sparkman was struggling with debt. She pored over personal finance books, but says the advice was impractical and the tone often judgmental.

Then she came across Elizabeth Warren’s book.

First published in 2005 and written with her daughter, Amelia Warren Tyagi, “All Your Worth” popularized a simple budget plan: 50% on needs, 30% on wants and 20% on savings.

Sparkman checked the audio version out of her library -- savings: $12 -- in Fayetteville, Arkansas, and listened as Warren and Tyagi offered advice, sprinkled with arguments that the rules of the financial system had made it harder for everyday Americans to get ahead.

For thousands of readers, Warren’s book on personal finance was their introduction to the Democratic presidential candidate, then best known as a Harvard professor who studied bankruptcy. Long before Candidate Warren had a plan for everything from cradle to grave, Professor Warren had a plan for getting your own finances under control.

The book also previewed the campaign she’s run so far: A nuts-and-bolts plan to deal with the large structural problems facing the American middle class with a folksy, can-do optimism.

“What I liked about Elizabeth Warren’s book was that it acknowledged that there are flaws in the system, that it’s more difficult to get on top than for our parents’ generation,” Sparkman said. “She didn’t treat it as a moral failing.”

 

The advice lines up neatly with her campaign: “All Your Worth” tells readers to pay off debt; the Warren campaign wants to cancel $640 billion of student loans. The book advises keeping the cost of necessities such as child care below half of your income; the campaign wants to ensure that no family spends more than 7% of its income on child care. “All Your Worth” advises black and Hispanic homebuyers to watch out for racial bias; the campaign wants to create a down-payment assistance program for areas that faced racial discrimination in mortgages.

The book led some readers to support the Warren campaign. Jackie Spano read “All Your Worth” at the start of the Great Recession in 2009 to learn more about personal finance, but found herself appreciating the asides where Warren criticized big banks and credit card companies.

“She called it,” she said. “She was going on about how the banks were taking advantage of everyday people and it’s not going to end well. I remember saying, ‘Oh my God, this is exactly what is going on today.’”

Now 35, the Yorktown Heights, N.Y., resident has a Warren sticker on her car and is considering registering as a Democrat for the first time so that she can vote for her in the presidential primary.

According to NPD BookScan, which tracks print and e-book sales, the book has sold more than 65,000 copies in print — roughly half as many as Warren’s 2014 memoir “A Fighting Chance” — but it has something of a cult following online, with the 50/30/20 budget plan regularly cited on financial advice websites.

Harold Pollack, co-author of the personal finance book “The Index Card,” says financial advice alternates between unrealistic plans to save a million dollars by giving up coffee and risky pitches for individual stocks on cable television.

He praised Warren’s book for giving simple, sensible advice for an audience of middle-class readers.

“It’s striking to me how much personal financial advice people get is actually quite negative and even harmful,” he said. “Some of the most valuable things in Elizabeth Warren’s work are the things that she does not write about.”

Warren takes aim at that kind of advice in the introduction to the book, arguing that penny-pinching plans are actually “dangerous” because they distract people from the big picture of ensuring that they can survive a downturn in their finances from a layoff or a medical problem.

She even takes a shot at a certain Manhattan mogul who was running get-rich-quick real-estate seminars at the time.

“We are also not going to say that if you’ll just shift to generic toilet paper and put $5 a week in the bank, all your problems will instantly disappear,” she writes. “A few pennies here and a few pennies there, and the next thing you know, you’ll be debt-free, investment-rich and lighting cigars with Donald Trump. Nope, we’re not selling that brand of snake oil.”

Although she rarely talks about “All Your Worth” on the campaign trail, Warren hasn’t stopped fighting what she views as bad financial advice.

When JPMorgan Chase & Co. drew a backlash in April for a tweet that argued that Americans weren’t saving because they buy fancy coffee, eat out and take cabs too much, Warren joined in, tweeting that it was actually because they lost their “jobs/homes/savings but gave you a $25b bailout.”

She was also a strong advocate for the fiduciary rule, an Obama-era requirement that brokers working on retirement accounts put customers’ interests first when, say, choosing among plans that offer them a commission. A federal court later struck the fiduciary rule down, and a looser “best interest” standard replaced it.

Small Luxuries

Dennis Shirshikov, a financial analyst at Fit Small Business, teaches a course on the banking system at Queens College in New York. He often suggests the book to students who ask him for personal financial advice.

“You should definitely be honest with yourselves,” he said. “If you enjoy going to Starbucks, there’s no financial police that is going to come and arrest you.”

Sparkman said that giving herself permission to spend money on small luxuries made the book more appealing to her.

“You’re not going to do the financial equivalent of binge-eating under Elizabeth Warren’s plan,” she said.

Ross Gerber, president and chief executive officer of wealth management firm Gerber Kawasaki, said Warren appears to follow her own financial advice. After looking over the financial disclosure forms she was required to file as a presidential candidate, he pointed out that she had maximized her retirement savings and invested in low-cost mutual funds.

“I was impressed,” he said. “She did exactly what we advise clients to do who are teachers like her. She saves very aggressively and she doesn’t live a lavish lifestyle,” he added. “She owns broad-based and well-diversified mutual funds.”

“I wouldn’t call her a risk taker, but it’s a very prudent strategy,” Gerber said.

 

 

 

Fancy that, she’s an expert on financial responsibility.

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On 8/29/2019 at 7:56 AM, Hugo Stiglitz said:

"If we would have attracted crowd sizes that large early on, Hillary would have run for the hills," the aide said, referring to Hillary Clinton, who Obama beat out in the 2008 primary.

*If we had attracted crowd sizes that large early on, Hillary would have run for the hills.

I shan't vote for any candidate who sees fit to employ such agrammatical Visigoths as aides.

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On 8/29/2019 at 10:11 AM, bad_teammate said:

Warren's big crowd in Seattle from the Space Needle.

HUGO DO NOT OPEN THIS SPOILER

 

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That's not even close to 15k people.

Maybe half that. Good crowd, though!

 

People in trees BT, there are people in trees!

 

I hope this Warren wave continues.

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"Worry not about the gays or minorities or the disadvantaged or the LGBT, my daughter, look thee upon the proper management of the markets." - God, 1949-2016

"OK, I guess the gays and minorities and the disadvantaged and LGBT are important, too." - God, 2016-Present

Her and Pete sound exceedingly lame talking about this crap

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Just now, bad_teammate said:

"Worry not about the gays or minorities or the disadvantaged or the LGBT, my daughter, look thee upon the proper management of the markets." - God, 1949-2016

"OK, I guess the gays and minorities and the disadvantaged and LGBT are important, too." - God, 2016-Present

Her and Pete sound exceedingly lame talking about this crap



As opposed to Donald:
 

 

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Hell yeah. 

100% Clean Energy for America

https://medium.com/@teamwarren/100-clean-energy-for-america-de75ee39887d

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The science is clear. The world’s leading experts have long known that climate change is caused by human beings, it is here, and it is accelerating. We already see its effects — record floods, devastating wildfires, 100-year storms that happen every year — costing lives, causing hundreds of billions of dollars in damage, and disproportionately impacting our most vulnerable communities, including communities of color, children, and low-income communities. This is an emergency, and without rapid and widespread change, we will soon be unable to prevent the worst harms.

The climate crisis will leave no one untouched. But it also represents a once-in-a-generation opportunity: to create millions of good American jobs in clean and renewable energy, infrastructure, and manufacturing; to unleash the best of American innovation and creativity; to rebuild our unions and create real progress and justice for workers; and to directly confront the racial and economic inequality embedded in our fossil fuel economy.

The world must limit warming to below 1.5° C to avoid the most catastrophic outcomes, cutting carbon pollution roughly in half by 2030 and achieving net-zero emissions by 2050. As the world’s largest historical carbon polluter, the United States has a special responsibility to lead the way.

That’s why I’m an original supporter of the Green New Deal, which challenges us to go above and beyond — to launch a ten-year mobilization through 2030 to achieve net-zero domestic greenhouse gas emissions as fast as possible.

It’s also why I’ve woven climate mitigation and resilience throughout my policy proposals, because we won’t meet our climate goals with a one-time, one-size-fits-all approach — we’ll need big, structural change, across a range of industries and sectors, and sustained over time.

These ideas are just the beginning. We must do more. Taking bold action to confront the climate crisis is as important — and as urgent — as anything else the next president will face. We cannot wait.

As a presidential candidate, my friend Governor Jay Inslee challenged all Americans to confront the urgency of the climate crisis bearing down upon us. And Jay didn’t merely sound the alarm or make vague promises. He provided bold, thoughtful, and detailed ideas for how to get us where we need to go, both by raising standards to address pollution and investing in the future of the American economy. While his presidential campaign may be over, his ideas should remain at the center of the agenda.

One of the most important of these ideas is the urgent need to decarbonize key sectors of our economy. Today, I’m embracing that goal by committing to adopt and build on Governor Inslee’s ten-year action plan to achieve 100% clean energy for America by decarbonizing our electricity, our vehicles, and our buildings. And I’m challenging every other candidate for President to do the same.

As Governor Inslee noted in his 100% Clean Energy for America plan, tackling these key sectors of our economy will make an immediate difference. Electricity, transportation, buildings, and related commercial activity are responsible for nearly 70 percent of all U.S. carbon emissions. We have the technology today to start to construct a cleaner grid, to modernize our auto industry, and to green our communities. My Green Apollo plan to invest $400 billion over ten years in clean energy R&D will spur innovation and help us to develop the technology we need to go the final mile. Critically, I will condition these R&D investments on any resulting manufacturing taking place right here in America, to create good middle-class jobs. My Green Manufacturing plan to invest $1.5 trillion over ten years in federal procurement of American-made clean energy products will fund the transition for federal, state, and local governments. My plan for public lands makes an unprecedented commitment to generate 10% of our overall electricity needs from renewable sources offshore or on public lands. And my Green Marshall Plan will commit $100 billion to support the export of American-made clean energy products so that we can help other countries cut their emissions too.

Today, I’m announcing I’ll commit an additional $1 trillion over 10 years — fully paid for by reversing Trump’s tax cuts for the wealthiest individuals and giant corporations — to match Governor Inslee’s commitment, and to subsidize the economic transition to clean and renewable electricity, zero emission vehicles, and green products for commercial and residential buildings.

All told, a federal investment of $3 trillion will leverage additional trillions in private investment and create millions of jobs. And we will achieve:

  • By 2028, 100% zero-carbon pollution for all new commercial and residential buildings;
  • By 2030, 100% zero emissions for all new light-duty passenger vehicles, medium-duty trucks, and all buses;
  • By 2035, 100% renewable and zero-emission energy in electricity generation, with an interim target of 100% carbon-neutral power by 2030.

These goals may be a decade away, but the work to achieve them must start now. Congress should act immediately to reduce emissions and begin the transition to clean and renewable power. But there’s also a lot that a president can do on her own — and I’ll take decisive action in my first term, using my powers under the Clean Air Act and other authorities to set high regulatory standards and impose ambitious interim targets along the way.

Nothing less than a national mobilization will be required to defeat climate change. It will require every single one of us, and it’s time to roll up our sleeves and get to work — there is no time to waste.

Partnering with Workers to Ensure No One Is Left Behind

The task before us is huge and demands all of us. It will require retrofitting our nation’s buildings, reengineering our electrical grid, and adapting our manufacturing base to increase the production of zero emission vehicles. It will also require readjusting our economic approach to ensure that communities of color and others who have been systematically excluded from our fossil fuel economy are not left behind during the transition to clean energy.

But it is also an opportunity. We’ll need millions of workers: people who know how to build things and manufacture them; skilled and experienced contractors to plan and execute large construction and engineering projects; and training and joint labor management apprenticeships to ensure a continuous supply of skilled, available workers. We cannot succeed in fighting climate change unless the people who have the skills to get the job done are in the room as full partners.

We’ll ensure benefits to uplift and empower workers who may be hurt by the transition to a more green economy, including for coal workers and others currently employed in the fossil fuel industry. That means providing them with financial security — including early retirement benefits — job training, union protections, and benefits, and guaranteeing wage and benefit parity for affected workers.

Moreover, we will no longer force workers to make the impossible choice between fossil fuel industry jobs with superior wages and benefits and green economy jobs that pay far less. The jobs we create will be unionized jobs with accompanying pay scales and benefits. For too long, there has been a tension between transitioning to a green economy and creating good, middle class, union jobs. In a Warren administration, we will do both things.

Nor can we look away from the frontline communities that have endured air and water pollution for decades — and that are now disproportionately threatened by accelerating climate change. Everyone has the right to breathe clean air, to drink clean water, and to live in healthy communities free of pollution. But today, communities of color and low-income communities are disproportionately impacted by environmental hazards — and that impact is even greater for children.

We cannot afford to perpetuate the structural inequalities embedded in the existing system as we move toward a clean energy future. Our response must prioritize resources for people and communities left behind by the fossil fuel economy and hit worst by climate change and pollution. We’ll do that by ensuring that investments spur economic development in every part of the country, not just the coasts. We’ll invest in community-developed projects, because the people who live and work in an area best know its needs. And we’ll create truly participatory and democratic processes, centered on and led by those living on the front lines of climate change.

This is the promise of the Green New Deal. We can lift up frontline communities, empower workers, and tackle climate change — all at the same time. And we’ll do that while decarbonizing the sectors that contribute the most to our pollution problem. Here’s how that will work.

100% Clean Electricity

Electricity consumption contributes about one third of all carbon pollution today — but the good news is that renewables are the fastest growing source of electricity generation. Renewable energy continues to drop in cost, and in many parts of the world it’s already cheaper than fossil fuels, even without subsidies. And states — including my home state of Massachusetts and Governor Inslee’s home state of Washington — are already leading the way in adoption. While technical challenges around transmission and storage remain, increasing renewable energy and investments in smart grids and advanced distribution can improve reliability, bring down costs, and open up new economic opportunities. Achieving 100% clean electricity will also help us to decarbonize our transportation and buildings. And we will put in place project labor agreements and other protections to ensure that the jobs created are union jobs with accompanying pay scales and benefits.

As president, I’ll work to rapidly achieve 100% clean, renewable and zero-emission energy in electricity generation. To do that, we will:

Set high standards for utilities nationwide. My administration will require utilities to achieve 100% carbon-neutral power by 2030, with strong interim targets along the way, and to achieve all-clean, renewable, and zero-emission energy in electricity generation by 2035. We’ll also establish regulations to retire coal power within a decade, while ensuring that we do not leave coal communities behind by funding health care and pensions for miners.

Create a Federal Renewable Energy Commission.I’ll work with Congress to overhaul the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, which is tasked with regulating the U.S. electrical grid, replacing it instead with a Federal Renewable Energy Commission. The revised commission’s mission will be to reduce greenhouse gas pollution — and we’ll slam shut the revolving door with industry to ensure it is responsive not to fossil fuel interests but to our communities.

Use the strength of federal investment and policy to accelerate the transition. I’ll require federal agencies to achieve 100% clean energy in their domestic power purchases by the end of my first term. And as I committed in my Public Lands plan, I’ll set a goal of providing 10% of our overall electricity generation from renewable sources offshore or on public lands — nearly ten times what we are currently generating.

Provide federal subsidies to speed clean energy adoption. We’ll expand existing federal energy financing programs, like the Department of Energy’s Loan Guarantee Program and the Rural Utilities Service, including by providing direct grants for clean energy projects. We’ll extend programs to provide grants in lieu of tax credits, establish refundable tax incentives to speed utilities’ deployment of existing smart grid and advanced transmission technologies, and work with utilities to increase on-bill investment in energy efficiency solutions, including by subsidizing those investments for low-income communities. And we’ll implement community workforce and project-labor agreements to ensure that the jobs created by these investments are good, union jobs, with prevailing wages determined through collective bargaining.

Expand interstate and regional coordination. To maximize efficiency of the grid, I’ll provide incentives to expedite planning and siting of long-distance and inter-state transmission of clean electricity. We’ll prioritize areas with significant queues of clean-energy generation capacity awaiting transmission. We’ll provide dedicated support for the four Power Marketing Administrations, the Tennessee Valley Authority, and the Appalachian Regional Commission to help them build publicly-owned clean energy assets and deploy clean power to help communities transition off fossil fuels. And we’ll expand investments in smart energy storage solutions and cybersecurity for the grid.

100% Clean Vehicles

The market for electric vehicles is expanding rapidly around the world, as their range increases and the cost of electric car batteries drops precipitously. On average, zero-emission vehicles are already cheaper to drive than cars that run on gasoline. But instead of accelerating innovation in this sector, the Trump administration is busy attempting to loosen automobile emissions standards, even over the U.S. auto industry’s protests. Meanwhile, the European Union is tighteningits own standards, and China — already the world’s largest producer of electric vehicles — is making aggressive inroads to dominate the global market. At least 10 countries have set aggressive electric vehicle targets, some to eliminate carbon-emitting cars entirely. To remain competitive, and to help save the planet, American automobile manufacturing must keep up.

A Warren administration will set a goal of achieving zero emissions in all new light-duty passenger vehicles, medium-duty trucks, and buses by 2030. To achieve this, we will:

Set ambitious standards for fuels and emissions. In my first year in office, I’ll set strict vehicle emissions standards that will become progressively tighter every year, reaching a requirement for 100% zero-emissions for all new light- and medium-duty vehicles by 2030. At the same time, I’ll establish a Clean Fuel Standard to further reduce greenhouse gas emissions by promoting lower-carbon alternative fuels.

Modernize the automotive manufacturing base and developing needed infrastructure. I’ll provide federal investments to grow domestic zero-emission vehicle manufacturing and reinforce the assembly plants and supply base, including battery manufacturing. I’ll also invest in electric vehicle charging infrastructure, including ensuring that every federal interstate highway rest stop hosts a fast-charging station by the end of my first term in office, and ensuring that charging stations are as widespread and accessible tomorrow as gas stations are today.

Boost consumer demand for zero emission vehicles. I’ll extend business and consumer tax credits for purchasing zero-emission vehicles. And I’ll create a “Clean Cars for Clunkers” program, based on the Recovery Act trade-in program, to extend financial incentives to encourage consumers to replace fuel-inefficient cars with zero-emission vehicles, made in America, by union workers. My Green Manufacturing plan commits $1.5 trillion over ten years for the federal procurement of clean, green, American-made products, including zero-emission vehicles. We’ll use this funding to require rapid electrification of the federal vehicle fleet, requiring that all new vehicle purchases be zero-emission by the end of my first term. And we’ll work with state and local governments to accelerate the electrification of their vehicle fleets as well, including by financing the transition from diesel to zero-emission transit and school buses.

Decarbonize other forms of transit. We cannot stop at cars and buses — we must address carbon pollution from all forms of transportation, including maritime, rail, and aviation, and expand and improve public transit across our country. And in addition to transforming the vehicle sector, my administration will invest in research that prioritizes decarbonization of long-distance shipping and transportation — two of the most challenging sectors to decarbonize. Aviation pollution in particular remains fast-growing. As president, I’ll commit to international goals to hold climate pollution from civil aviation to 2020 levels, and then reduce them over time.

100% Clean Buildings

Buildings and construction account for over one-third of global energy use and carbon emissions, when embodied carbon is included — and as the world continues to urbanize, those emissions are growing. In the United States, we spend over $400 billion each year to provide electricity and heat for our homes and businesses. We can make significant progress in decarbonizing our buildings by achieving clean electricity generation, reducing energy waste, and increasing energy efficiency. Doing so will improve both air quality and health outcomes. And it will create good, union construction jobs — jobs that cannot be outsourced or sent overseas.

As president, I’ll commit to take immediate action to achieve zero-carbon pollution from all new commercial and residential buildings by the end of my second term in 2028. To make that happen, we will:

Adopt bold standards for construction. I’ll create a national zero-carbon building standard by 2023, and I’ll partner with states and local governments to enforce new and stronger building codes. My administration will provide incentives for local governments to adopt more aggressive standards, bringing down emissions. We’ll link energy and pollution standards to federal support for new construction projects, by building them into agencies’ grantmaking requirements, federal housing tax credits, and green mortgage products offered by federal housing finance agencies. And I’ll direct federal agencies to accelerate proven appliance energy efficiency standards, making American-manufactured appliances cleaner and more competitive, and saving consumers money.

Use federal buying power to drive change. I’ll use the power of the federal government to shift the market by accelerating the adoption of a rule to eliminate all fossil fuel use in new and renovated federal buildings — moving that deadline up by five years to the end of my first term, by 2025. We’ll use a portion of the $1.5 trillion federal procurement commitment in my Green Manufacturing plan to purchase clean energy products for use in federal buildings, from construction materials to heat storage technology to appliances. And we’ll increase access to federal financing for retrofits and new construction, to upgrade public buildings at all levels of government.

Encourage private capital investments. I’ll create incentives for private investment in energy efficiency and electrification in residential and commercial buildings, including through tax credits, direct spending, and regulatory tools. We’ll expand refundable credits for installing energy efficiency upgrades, and extend existing tax credits for wind and solar power. And we’ll make it easier for institutional capital to invest in portfolio-scale green construction and retrofits, scaling up clean energy in large commercial and residential projects.

Incentivize retrofits of existing building stock. In addition to achieving zero emissions in new buildings, we must address our existing stock of commercial buildings and residential housing. Green housing can’t be a perk available only for the wealthy — it must be made affordable for everyone. I’ll establish a national initiative to upgrade building energy efficiency, offering tax credits, generous and inclusive financing, and direct federal funding to put Americans to work reducing the carbon output of existing homes and businesses, including subsidizing weatherization for low-income households — and I’ll meet Governor Inslee’s target of refurbishing 4% of houses and buildings every year until the job is done.


If we work together to make smart investments in our clean energy future, we will grow our economy, improve our health, and reduce structural inequalities embedded in our existing fossil fuel system. The task before us is monumental, and it is urgent. But I’m confident that America has the tools, the know-how, and the will to make it happen. As president, I will take bold action to confront the climate crisis, starting on day one. The future of our planet depends on it, and we have no more time to waste.

Edited by Hugo Stiglitz
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Characteristically, Johansson has resisted pressure from her politically minded friends to take a wait-and-see attitude to the Democratic primary. "Other Democrats have said to me, 'Oh, it's really early to back someone,' " Johansson says. "That kind of worries me because it doesn't feel that early to me. I'm like, 'Really?' It's disconcerting that there's not a clear candidate at this time." Johansson says she is supporting Elizabeth Warren. "She feels like someone who is thoughtful and progressive but realistic," Johansson says. "It's not like her campaign is making these crazy, outlandish promises that seem impossible to reach. There's a strategy there." She says she'll be involved in the presidential election, whoever faces Donald Trump. "I'll be there however I'm needed," Johansson says. "If I can help with voter engagement, whether it's doing some sort of PSA campaign or actively trying to involve people in the process of registering and voting. I really believe if people actually did vote, our government would look the way it's supposed to, but people just don't vote. It baffles me."

 

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