The Democratic platform committee rejected an appeal to include the carbon tax as part of the party’s official platform. Instead, the platform sticks to broad goals, including a pledge for the U.S. to derive 50 percent of its energy from renewable sources within ten years, ramping to 100 percent by 2050.
Conservative advocates for a carbon tax were neither shocked nor disappointed by the move.
“I don’t think carbon taxes are going to get political traction unless Republicans put them on the table and initiate the conversation,” said Jerry Taylor, president and founder of the Niskanen Center, a libertarian think tank that advocates for a revenue neutral carbon tax. “Republicans need to have their own branded answer for climate.”
“It could make it harder to sell it to conservatives,” said Eli Lehrer, president of the R Street Institute.
Likewise, republicEn.org’s executive director, Rep. Bob Inglis, said he was “relieved” by the failure to include a carbon tax on the Democratic platform. “We’d prefer for them not to be talking about a carbon tax.”