California Unions are blocking the climate bill targeted at oil companies

The oil companies had their hacks this year after Senator Scott Wiener Introduced a controversial bill to allow victims of fires and other climate disasters to judge them to cause climate change.

Faced with potentially billions of dollars losses, Big Oil had a lot to lose.

But oil companies took place last week when it was time to persuade environmental legislators to kill the legislation.

Instead, Big Oil’s most influential allies in the legislature controlled by California Proposes, which are workers in the oil industry, are the opposition. They have successfully convinced a committee composed of the Democrats of Professional Participants to kill the measure that has supported almost every environmental organization in California.

Despite California’s reputation that he took the leading role of climate change, the death of Senate Bill 222 is the most new example of how the most aggressive policies of environmentalists regularly break up When the great work works on behalf of Big OilS

“So oil companies break the machine in Sacramento,” said Jamie Court, president of ConsumerOne of the groups that supported the legislation.

Speaker of The Western State Petroleum AssociationWho usually represents the interests of the Sacramento oil company, declined to comment on why the Council of the California Council for Construction and Construction Transactions took on the lead in the murder of legislation.

Chris Hanan, the chairman of the Council of Trade, said the Union members fear that SB 222 will have a “freezing effect on our economy, determining gas prices through the roof, with absolutely no environmental benefits.”

“The terrible and terrible policy of this bill,” he said. “And this puts our jobs in danger and puts our condition in danger.”

Big money turns out to oppose the climate bill

At the hearing of the Senate Senate Council, Wiener, a Democrat from San Francisco, claims that his proposal was urgent after the January mass fires were torn through the Los Angeles County, destroying thousands of homes and exacerbating state residential and insurance crises.

“We should not have destructive fires in the middle of winter,” he He told the committee. “Still, this is the new normal in California. And now who pays for these climate disasters? Who pays for them? We pay for them.”

Wiener’s measure would allow the victims to sue oil companies for damage, but they will have to prove in court that climate change is guilty of their losses, which is not easy. While scientists have documented the connection between climate change and fossil fuels, the evidence is less final, connecting the fossil fuels with specific extreme meteorological events such as floods, sushi or wildfiresS

Two Wiener witnesses brought to testify in support of SB 222, they had lost their homes. They claimed that it was time for fossil fuel companies to pay their fair share.

“Disasters like this will continue to happen, but you can make the financial burden less terrible for all of us,” Moira Morel, whose home burns in the fire of Ethan, told the committeeS

After talking, representatives of more than 20 environmental groups and users of users went up the microphone, urging the committee to pass the measure.

Thehe California Federation of Teacherswhich gave at least $ 2.5 million to legislators from 2015 was the only major political donor that supports it, according to Digital democracy databaseS

But this is compared to what his opponents spent on policy: at least $ 22.7 million to members of the 2015 legislature, according to digital democracy.

They included large business groups such as California Chamber of Commerce and California Civil Justice AssociationWhose board of directors includes representatives of large corporations, including Amazon, Pfizer, Apple and Meta, who did not directly take up the account positions. These two groups of advocacy alone give nearly $ 2 million to lawmakers since 2015.

Michael McDonau, lawyer who spoke on behalf of the business groups, told the committee The bill was probably unconstitutional and “rearly punishes the legal fuel production for that country, which is crucial to the growth of California after its founding and which this legislative body supports nearly 150 years.”

Fosso fuel companies that opposed the bill but did not testify during the hearing from last week also donated at least $ 1.7 million to the 2015 legislators.

Democrats find the argument for union convincing

But the largest donors of the legislature that opposed SB 222 are unions. Thehe Board for State Construction and Construction TransactionsThehe State Association of Electric Workers in California and California Pipe Trade Board And their partner unions have given at least $ 12 million since 2015, according to digital democracy.

“SB 222 is unfairly aimed at an industry, while ignoring the wider systematic factors that contribute to climate change,” the lobbyist of trade unions, lobbyists, lobbyists, Iene., told the committeeS

Dozens of members of the Union of the Union-Pipefitters, manufacturers of boilers, artists, iron workers and others have taken the microphone after Dunn to call for legislators to comply with SB 222. It was a striking contrast in Capitol, where business clothing tends to be standard clothing.

The measure needed seven votes to escape from the Senate Judiciary Committee; He failed with only five votes in favor and eight recorded voices opposed. Still, only one Democrat on the Commission actually votes “No.” The others did not vote at all, which reported the same as without a voice. As CalMatters reported, The wide practice of avoiding hard voices Allows legislators to avoid accountability.

There are few groups more influential in state policy than unions in California, although they only represent One sixth of the country’s workforceS

As CalMatters reportedLabor groups regularly make their way to higher -rate accounts than other fruitful lobbying groups, which are partly due to their huge political donations. About a quarter of the members of the current legislative body are current or former members of the Union.

One of them is Sen. Maria Elena DurazoDemocrat from Los Angeles and a member of the committee that does not vote for the measure. The longtime former Labor activist told the committee that companies that cause climate change should be held accountable, but not at the expense of workers.

“I don’t want to let anyone on the hook, but I don’t want to let working people be on the hook for everything that happens,” Durazo told the committeeS

Her service did not respond to a request for an interview to ask why, if she opposed the measure, she did not vote a firm “no”. The four other Democrats in the Commission, who also did not vote for SB 222 – Aisha Wahab., Angelica Ashby., Tom Humberg and Jesse Regina – They refused Calmatters’ requests to explain in an interview why they did not vote.

Seni. Anna CabalaleroHe who represents Mersid was the only Democrat to vote “No.” Like Durazo, she found the arguments of Union members convincing. She said the cost of the measure would be too high. She called on the legislature to focus on the promotion of easy -to -see technologies such as “hydrogen, capture of carbon, biogas, biomass”.

“These are the types of jobs that will create a lively salary and will also give us the opportunity to achieve our climate goals,” Cabalerro told the committeeS “And I think we are all interested in the same purpose … But we will not achieve this through this lawsuit.”

Seni. Henry SternA Democrat, who lost his home in a fire in Woles in 2018, addressed Union workers just before voting to support the legislation.

He said the bill was about the transformation of multinational corporations responsible. He said oil companies threaten “their workers that they would fire them” if the legislature accepts SB 222.

“This is aimed at these shareholders and those people in the meeting room who make the big decisions at some corporate power plants in Houston or somewhere else, but not you,” he told the committeeS

In an interview, Wiener said he was not surprised that commercial unions were “struggling to keep these jobs.”

“But it continues to surprise me that California’s legislation does not accept oil accountability accounts with just a few exceptions,” he said. “I hope that the legislature will start to take a much more active position to hold the oil companies responsible for the enormous harm they have inflicted and do to California and the planet.”