Rep. Tim Ryan (D-OH-13) wants his fellow Democratic presidential candidates to join him in Youngstown, Ohio for a “climate debate.”
Ryan’s statement comes in response to the Democratic National Committee (DNC) voting against a resolution that would have allowed for single-issue debates, mainly a debate on climate change.
According to CNN, a DNC Resolutions Committee initially approved of the language after facing pressure from climate activists. The full DNC, however, voted down the resolution Saturday in a vote of 222-137.
Under the DNC’s rules, candidates are only allowed to appear together on stage at official DNC-sanctioned debates. Ryan is now calling for an end to this “exclusivity agreement,” saying in a statement that the DNC “got it wrong.”
The DNC got it wrong. We need a climate debate. Let’s have one in Youngstown.
My statement: pic.twitter.com/5ANTcuiciG
— Tim Ryan (@TimRyan) August 25, 2019
“It’s truly a disappointment that the DNC denied our party the opportunity to show America that a strong agenda that reverses climate change means high paying manufacturing jobs for American union workers and solid profits for American farmers,” Ryan said.
Ryan is inviting his fellow candidates to join him in his hometown of Youngstown to have a climate debate “in front of audience members from the industrial belt communities who want to know how climate change and green energy plans could affect them, and how we can use this moment to rebuild manufacturing jobs and our rural community.”
“Voters deserve a chance to know that we take this issue seriously and are going to be very proactive in reversing climate change, unlike the current administration,” Ryan added. “I want to thank Gov. Jay Inslee for spearheading this idea and we will continue to push to have the voices of so many Americans heard by our party.”
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) expressed her support for holding a climate debate before Saturday’s vote.
“Climate change is an existential crisis that threatens all of us – and we need to take bold action now to stop it before it’s too late. That’s why we need to have a climate debate,” she wrote on Twitter.
Climate change is an existential crisis that threatens all of us—and we need to take bold action now to stop it before it's too late. That's why we need to have a #ClimateDebate.
— Elizabeth Warren (@ewarren) August 24, 2019
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) released this week his own version of the “Green New Deal.”
“Let me be blunt: If we stick to a ‘middle ground’ approach of half measures when it comes to the climate crisis, our children and grandchildren will not have a livable planet,” he said on Twitter. “Those are the stakes of this moment.”
Let me be blunt:
If we stick to a "middle ground" approach or half measures when it comes to the climate crisis, our children and grandchildren will not have a livable planet.
Those are the stakes of this moment.
— Bernie Sanders (@BernieSanders) August 23, 2019
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Anthony Gockowski is managing editor of Battleground State News, The Ohio Star, and The Minnesota Sun. Follow Anthony on Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].
