In Florida Senate race, two candidates with vastly different views on the climate
Florida’s narrowing Senate race, between two candidates with vastly different views on the environment and climate, is shaping up to be consequential as each party pursues control of the chamber in November.
The incumbent, Rick Scott, a Republican, faces a formidable challenge from former U.S. Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell, a Democrat. Various recent polls indicate the contest is tightening. In one poll last month Scott led Mucarsel-Powell by a mere percentage point. Forty-five percent of would-be voters favored Scott, compared with 44 percent for Mucarsel-Powell, according to the Sept. 30 poll from Victory Insights. Eleven percent were undecided.
At stake is U.S. climate policy including the Inflation Reduction Act, the $370 billion package President Joe Biden signed into law in 2022. The monumental measure includes clean energy incentives that former President Donald Trump has vowed to repeal if re-elected.
“Florida could be decisive in helping to decide control of the U.S. Senate,” said Aubrey Jewett, associate director of the School of Politics, Security and International Affairs at the University of Central Florida and a co-author of the book Politics in Florida.
Even if Republicans do not win the presidency, “if they can win Florida they’re at 50, and then they just need to win one of the other competitive states,” he said. “For Democrats, if they could somehow get that upset in Florida, they would actually still have a chance of keeping control of the Senate.” [Continue reading…]