Biden speaks Tuesday in NYC to draw contrast between Democrats and Republicans on energy and climate

By Ella Nilsen, CNN

(CNN) — President Joe Biden will speak at Climate Week NYC on Tuesday, touting his administration’s vast climate agenda and drawing contrasts between Democratic action and Republicans who voted against his 2022 climate law, according to a White House official.

Biden will appear at the Bloomberg Global Business forum, according to the official, where he’ll speak about his work to lower planet-warming pollution in the US and create clean energy jobs while saving Americans money with energy tax subsidies. Details on Biden’s speech were shared first with CNN.

“The President will highlight how his Administration has delivered on the most ambitious climate agenda ever and restored America’s climate leadership around the world,” the White House official said in an email statement.

Vice President Kamala Harris is not on the official White House schedule to appear at climate week, which is an annual event in New York that encourages global climate action and takes place alongside the United Nations General Assembly, where global leaders will gather.

While there, in the final weeks of a neck-and-neck race for the White House between Harris and former President Donald Trump, Biden will draw a sharp contrast between Democrats and Republicans on energy and climate. The president will point out that Republicans voted unanimously against his climate bill, and many voted against Biden’s bipartisan infrastructure law.

Despite Republican opposition to the 2022 climate bill, CNN recently reported the vast majority of the hundreds of billions of dollars of announced investments has so far gone to Republican congressional districts. Many House Republicans are seeing their districts awash in jobs and cash as companies use clean energy tax credits to construct factories to build electric vehicles and their batteries, and as massive wind, solar, hydrogen and sustainable aviation fuel projects come online.

Americans are also taking advantage of the climate law in a big way; recent Treasury Department data shows more than 3.4 million US households claimed a whopping $8.4 billion to help offset the cost of rooftop solar panels, solar water heaters, home batteries and heat pumps.

In his four years in office, Biden cemented his legacy as the most pro-climate president after making the fight against climate change a central pillar of his administration. He signed billions of new clean energy tax credits and federal grant money into law in 2022 and oversaw dozens of ambitious federal regulations designed to slash pollution from US oil and gas, vehicles and power plants.

Biden will be joined in New York by eight high-profile White House and administration climate and energy officials, including national climate adviser Ali Zaidi, senior adviser to the President for international climate policy John Podesta, Energy Sec. Jennifer Granholm and Environmental Protection Agency administrator Michael Regan.

Administration officials will make a series of announcements throughout next week, focused on their work to make the US more resilient to climate impacts and giving young people more ways to secure climate and clean energy jobs.

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