The House Energy and Commerce committee is finalizing the markup on their groundbreaking climate bill, the American Clean Energy and Secuirty Act (ACES). This bill has the potential to build a green economy strong enough to lift people out of poverty, create millions of green jobs, and stave off the threat of the climate crisis. Despite its potential, it still needs tons of work. Last week the E&C committee held tons of hearings and, as usual, young people (PowerShifters) were present! Check out what Joshua Tulkin, the Energy Action Coalition Field Director had to say about it:

Over 100 young in Power Shift shirts and green hard hats flooded capitol hill over four days, filling security lines, the hearings rooms, and all the space around talking to lobbyists, legislators, and staffers about solutions to the climate crisis.   While big oil and coal companies hired “line standers” to save them a spot hours before, we relied on good old fashion people power to pack the hearings,  providing a moral compass and delivering a strong message “it’s our future is at stake, don’t let us down”. 

Students got there as early as 4:00 AM to line up and most were rewarded with great seats. As Energy and Commerce committee members  looked out into the audience, they simply could not ignore us.   We were everywhere.   And out in the interweb, we were THE center of attention.  We had an ongoing live-blog @ ItsGettingHotInHere.org and a crazy twitter feed,  that brough the Energy Action Coalition 200 new followers and created a huge buzz where we were the center of attention. 

When we weren’t in the hearing we were organizing phonebanking in the hall, calling youth from across the country to take action, reminding reps that were were only a few among an entire movement. 

 

Highlights in DC

• Several reps gave us a special shout out during the hearing.  Congressman Bruce Braley (IA) said that “for your sake, we need to get this right” and Congresswoman Jane Harman (CA) suggested that they just put us in a room with USCAP lock the door, and “figure this thing out”.   And that’s not to mention dozens of conversations and photos we took with reps in the halls (us with Rep. Inslee D-WA below).  

• We made over 30 hill visits and met with more than a dozen environmental Legislative Assistants of offices of key committee members.
• Some of our staff and youth got an awesome picture with Al Gore on Friday (below).
• We staged a last minute protest against Newt Gingrich (who spoke on Friday after Al Gore and Sen John Warner) and got a great hit in the Washington Examiner (small local daily). 
• We delivered a bunch of early photo-petitions we received, giving them a taste of the 2000+ we’re going to deliver in the next few weeks.

Highlights from the Field

• Ashley Anderson of Salt Lake City flew out to DC and coordinated a daily phone-tree with his folks back home, generating around 100 calls and contributing great photos to the photo-petition with a unicorn, reading “no clean coal”.  
• Students from Muskingum College and OU Zaneville already generated 70 hand-written letters to Congressman Zach Space about the need to build the new green economy in Ohio.
• Students at University of Michigan made this awesome video for Congressman Dingell. 

As you can see, we had a ton of fun, and made a big difference. The bill is being edited as you are reading it and the only thing stopping representatives from weakening the bill is the memory of all those green shirts and their staffers lamenting how many phone calls they got from passionate young people. Keep up the calls, keep on showing up! One day, you might even end up meeting Al Gore!

If you haven’t yet, call your congressional representative now!

1. Find your Congressperson here.
2. Call 1-877-666-3393.  This line will give you a brief message and connect you to the Congressional switchboard.
3. Deliver this simple message:

“My name is ___ and I live in ____.  I’m ___ years old and I vote.  I am calling to ask Rep. XXX to pass bold legislation that creates a clean energy economy and makes polluters pay.”

If you want more specifics or talking points, check out the Power Shift policy principles here: http://powershift09.org/resources. Keep on rocking!