Latest California Innovation: A Republican Case for Cap and Trade

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Assembly GOP Leader Chad Mayes and seven fellow Republicans cast vital votes to ensure passage of cap and trade in California. Photo by Laurel Rosenhall for CALmatters

By Laurel Rosenhall, CALmatters

Minutes after a bipartisan coalition of California lawmakers voted to extend the state’s landmark climate-change policy for another decade, Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown stood in front of a bank of television cameras and compared the plan to one championed 30 years ago by GOP icon Ronald Reagan.

Back then, the Republican president helped negotiate the Montreal protocol to curb the release of gases that were destroying the ozone layer, persuading Republicans to join Democrats in approving “an insurance policy” that made economic sense in case environmentalists were right. Brown said the California cap-and-trade program the Legislature approved Monday night won support for a similar reason.

Read the complete story at CALmatters.

For more information about  California’s cap-and-trade program, read the San Francisco Public Press (in collaboration with Earth Island Journal and Bay Nature magazine) special report on climate change.

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