Opinion: Is This the Better Story That We Need?

Love, Justice and Climate Change

The actions Donald Trump has taken to increase the burning of fossil fuels, eliminate the transition to renewable energy, and increase the wealth of fossil fuel CEO’s have been mind-boggling. Each of these will worsen the climate crisis, and all its disastrous effects, both in the U.S. and throughout the world. They are guaranteed to increase global death and disease — from catastrophic weather events, famine causing droughts, wildfires, and deadly air pollution.

Dismissal
Trump and his henchmen have shifted from climate denial (“It’s a hoax.”) to outright dismissal of the issue. For instance, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth tweeted, “The Department of Defense does not do climate change crap. We do training and warfighting.” Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rolllins said, “We’re not doing climate change crud anymore.” Climate change denial has become even harder to justify as the scientific evidence and weather disasters have increased. “Dismissal, on the other hand, is a way of saying, ‘It’s beneath our contempt. We don’t even have to debate this—we’ll just call it crap,’” Texas A&M communications professor Jennifer Mercieca says.

People Want Climate Action
All of this comes as a poll of nearly 130,000 people across 125 countries finds that 89% of people want their governments to do more to address the climate crisis. In the U.S., a poll taken after Trump was elected, but before he took office found that 75% of U.S. registered voters wanted federal agencies to maintain (20%) or increase (55%) their efforts to protect people from the health harms of global warming. Another U.S. poll taken last fall found both Republicans (52%) and Democrats (83%) said “protecting the environment for future generations” was “very important” to them.

Link Between Concentration of Wealth and Fossil Fuels
There is an historic link between concentration of wealth and fossil fuels. Bill McKibben writes, “As Samuel Miller McDonald pointed out in his 2024 book Progress, as the 19^th century began the richest one percent held just 8.5 percent of America’s wealth; by the time it ended, the top dogs had fifty percent of the money, ‘partly thanks to fossil fuels, which could be easily concentrated, controlled, and transformed into liquid capital by a small management class.’”

A further link between wealth and climate change is demonstrated by recent reporting that the world’s wealthiest 10% have caused two-thirds of all global warming since 1990.

Throughout the world, fossil fuel interests tend to support authoritarian rulers and authoritarian rulers promote fossil fuels. Whether it is Vladimir Putin, the oil rulers around Qatar (which just bribed Trump with a 747 plane), or the Koch brothers manipulating U.S. politics with their oil-gained billions, the link is strong. One report found that the fossil fuel industry spent $450 million dollars during the 2024 election cycle to support Trump and his Republican cronies. They certainly seem to be getting their money’s worth in policies that will line their pockets for years to come.

Solar Power is Decentralized Power
Solar power, by contrast, does not lend itself to the same sort of concentration of wealth. The sun is everywhere and the sun is free. This is a major reason why solar power is so threatening to the billionaire class. It holds the potential for a decentralized power system controlled by people at the local level — both in the U.S. and globally. India just became the third largest generator of renewable energy (after China and the U.S.) and appears to be on track to surpass the U.S. in the not too distant future.

It seems clearer every day that the struggles against authoritarianism, against billionaire control, and against climate disaster are all one struggle. We will not be able to win on climate, if we don’t also win on authoritarianism and domination by the ultra-rich.

A Better Story
I wrote recently about the importance of our not just being against Trump and fascism, but also being for transformative change. In another post I quoted Naomi Klein and Astra Taylor saying that we need to tell a better story than the right wing is telling — a story in which no one is left behind, a story of interdependence and belonging. Last week we got a huge demonstration of how such a story can be told and result in success. Zohran Mamdani, surprisingly, won the Democratic primary election for mayor of New York City.

Zohran Mamdani
Mamdani started as a relatively unknown and way behind former governor of New York State, Andrew Cuomo, in the polls. Mamdani ran on a platform of making NYC affordable for everyone, and built a powerful grassroots campaign that included young people, workers, and people of all backgrounds. Mamdani is a 33 year old, Muslim, democratic socialist, with pro-Palestinian views, who stayed laser-focused on making the city affordable. He went everywhere, talked and listened to everyone, and seem to connect with virtually anyone.

Mamdani campaigned on a plan for freezing rent on rent-stabilized housing and building more affordable housing with union labor; free and faster public buses; community safety including increased mental health services; city-owned grocery stores; free childcare; while also increasing taxes on the rich and the corporations; and resisting Trump.

Cuomo left the governorship in disgrace over sexual harassment of women and manipulated COVID statistics, but was the front-runner throughout this race. He was supported by millions of dollars from Michael Bloomberg and endorsed by Bill Clinton. Mamdani was endorsed by Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Apparently, the corporate fat cats of the Democratic party are now afraid of Mamdani and attempting to undermine the significance of his victory, but I think he’s exactly what’s needed.

Russ Vernon-Jones was principal of Fort River School 1990-2008 and is currently a member of the Steering Committee of Climate Action Now-Western Massachusetts. He blogs regularly on climate justice at www.russvernonjones.org.