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Climate bill isn't a priority for most Americans -- Gallup poll

(05/04/2010)

Katherine Ling, E&E reporter

Link to Article

Energy legislation is not the legislative priority for Democrats, Republicans or independents, according to a Gallup poll released yesterday.

Despite devastating pictures of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill filling the news cycle, the Gallup poll found only about one in five of Americans surveyed would list energy and climate legislation as the highest priority for Congress. Instead, 39 percent of respondents listed financial reform as the highest priority, followed by 36 percent of Americans who said immigration should be highest priority right now.

Along party lines, 47 percent of Democratic respondents listed financial regulation reform as their highest priority for Congress. A narrow 27 percent of Democrats prefer tackling energy legislation next after financial reform, as opposed to 24 percent who prefer immigration reform next, according to the poll.

More than 40 percent of independents and Republicans polled said immigration reform legislation should be Congress' highest priority. Financial reform was the second highest priority for 33 percent of independents and 37 percent of Republicans in the poll.

The results are based on telephone interviews with 1,013 national adults, conducted April 27-28, 2010. Gallup said with 95 percent confidence that the maximum margin of sampling error is 4 percentage points.

"Legislators looking to the public for guidance on prioritizing legislation will not find crystal clear direction," said Frank Newport of Gallup. "It is clear, however, that despite efforts to move energy and climate-change legislation forward, Americans at this point give it the lowest priority -- consistent with previous Gallup research showing that Americans are less worried about the environment than they have been previously."

The Senate is currently debating a financial reform bill that Democrats would like to finish up by the end of next week, although it is not clear if they can reach that deadline given the number of controversial amendments. The House passed its financial reform bill in December.

The legislative priority for the Senate after the financial bill given the limited amount of time remaining before midterm elections has been the subject of a tumultuous debate. The Senate must also consider President Obama's Supreme Court nominee to fill the seat of Justice John Paul Stevens, who is retiring in June.

Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) were set to reveal a climate bill last week, but Graham pulled out at the last minute after Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) indicated he would also move on immigration reform. Graham said Reid's actions were just a political ploy and would eliminate any chance of passing a climate and energy bill this year (E&E Daily, April 30). The House already passed an energy and climate bill last year, and the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee also passed an energy bill last year.

Neither the House nor the Senate has introduced or passed a comprehensive immigration bill.

Marchant Wentworth of the Union of Concerned Scientists, said he was not surprised by the poll's conclusion, "but it doesn't have much to do with the reality of the situation. The Senate could choose to turn on to anything they wanted to."

He added, "The Senate can do more than one thing at a time. ... We would like to tell both of them, Reid and Graham, work it out and move on with the Senate's business."

Clean Air Watch President Frank O'Donnell said the poll's findings were not surprising either, given that it was conducted right after the Securities and Exchange Commission charged Goldman Sachs with fraud, and it was before the full extent of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill was discovered.

"The bottom line on the polling is that it reinforces the impression that the energy-climate issue is largely an inside-the-Beltway issue and that those calling for major change have not effectively reached audiences outside the Beltway," O'Donnell said.

"Both parties are struggling to figure out how to play the oil spill to their political advantage," he added. "The politics -- and the potential for demagoguery -- are much more obvious in the cases of financial reform and immigration."

Click here to view the poll.

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