Rep. Jared Golden recently wrote in the Press Herald (“Build Back Better bill needs more work to get my vote,” Oct. 7) that while he strongly supports the bipartisan infrastructure bill passed by the Senate, the Build Back Better Act, which would be passed through reconciliation, needs more work to get his vote.
The reconciliation bill contains much-needed investments in health, education, child care and climate action, and would be paid for through partial rollbacks of previous tax cuts for corporations and high-income earners. The bill’s climate provisions are essential, and here’s why:
• We are out of time to respond to the climate crisis. A warming climate and extreme weather are increasingly threatening our food production, economic activity and the diversity of life on our planet.
• We have a limited political opportunity to act, with pro-climate leadership in control of the White House, Senate and House. Another such opportunity is not likely to come again until it’s too late.
• A major international conference on climate, COP 26, will take place in November, at which demonstrated U.S. leadership will be needed to convince other nations to act as well.
The climate provisions in the reconciliation bill are aimed at achieving 80 percent clean electricity and 50 percent economy-wide carbon emissions reductions by 2030. For the sake of human well-being and life on our planet, it is essential they be fully enacted now.
Probably no representative or senator supports every measure in either the infrastructure or reconciliation bills, but it’s time for congressional Democrats and willing Republicans to shift their focus from further revisions and come together to pass both bills, including their provisions to protect our climate.
Daniel Hildreth
Falmouth
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