Lois Capps: “I thank my colleague for yielding. There is an argument on the other side of the aisle--in fact, we heard it just a few…”

“I thank my colleague for yielding. There is an argument on the other side of the aisle--in fact, we heard it just a few minutes ago--that we shouldn't take action to address climate change because doing so will hurt poor people. That is a particularly galling statement because the truth is that the world's poorest have the most to lose if we don't take urgent action to cut carbon pollution. Poor people are on the front lines of climate change. World Bank President Jim Yong Kim says that, unless we address climate change, ``We could witness the rolling back of decades of development gains and force tens of millions more to live in poverty.'' According to the United Nations Development Programme, without coordinated global action to address climate and environmental threats, 3 billion more people could be pushed into extreme poverty by 2050. That is the reality. The world's poorest will be the most affected by the impacts of climate change, and yet they have the fewest resources to adapt to or respond to it. To hear the other side tell it, the only way to protect the health and well-being of poor people is to weaken EPA's ability to cut carbon pollution, and that is nonsense. It is time to stop denying the science and accept reality. We need to take action now to cut carbon pollution. The longer we wait, the higher the costs will be, especially for the poor. Indeed, addressing climate change is in the economic self-interest of all of us.…”