A Look Back at Vice President Kamala Harris on Climate Leadership, Justice, and Solutions
A Matter of Degrees
Dr. Leah Stokes, Dr. Katharine Wilkinson
4.8 • 533 Ratings
🗓️ 26 August 2024
⏱️ 53 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Welcome back for a special bonus episode of A Matter of Degrees! In this episode, we are taking a look back at our live conversation with Vice President Kamala Harris. Since we are once again at a pivotal moment for the climate, we wanted to kick off our new season by looking back at this incredible climate leader who has played a key role in getting us where we are today. We are excited to share this inspiring conversation with you one more time…
"We must understand that we are in a very specific moment in time, and this window is going to shut on us. But it doesn't have to shut on us, if we act." — Vice President Kamala Harris on A Matter of Degrees
Ahead of the 2022 midterm elections, we had the honor of joining Vice President Harris live in San Francisco for a conversation about climate leadership, justice, and solutions. She underlined the critical importance of the current moment, and the need to act with urgency in service of what's still possible.
This episode covers a lot of ground, from electric school buses and job creation to the direct link between reproductive justice and climate justice. Vice President Harris shares her personal motivation for doing environmental work, and explains what the Biden-Harris administration is doing on the policy front. Leah cites this academic study on the intergenerational impacts of prenatal exposure to air pollution and points us to a tool for calculating EV and heat pump rebates in the Inflation Reduction Act. Katharine references the Pentagon's 2014 report describing climate change as a "threat multiplier."
We hope you find the conversation informative and inspiring. Fun fact, this is our first appearance in front of a live audience!
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Well, hello, Leah Stokes. |
| 0:05.0 | Well, hello, Catherine Wilkinson. |
| 0:06.9 | It's been a while. |
| 0:08.0 | It has been a minute. |
| 0:09.9 | In fact, it has been over a year since our last episode, which is a little bit hard to believe. |
| 0:16.7 | What have you been doing these last 12 months, Leah? |
| 0:19.8 | Too much, probably. |
| 0:20.9 | You know, research, raising twin toddlers, battling the fossil fuel industry, a fair amount |
| 0:27.5 | trying to make sure that our climate laws are implemented well, preventing climate chaos. |
| 0:33.1 | Oh, and the other thing is I've been writing a book. |
| 0:35.3 | That's been eating up a fair amount of my time. |
| 0:37.6 | I tell you what, middle age, it is a juggle. And frankly, a lot of heavy lifting. |
| 0:42.9 | Yes. And what have you been up to, Catherine? Let's see. I've been running an organization, |
| 0:48.8 | training educators across the U.S. and Canada, trying to continue the work of growing the climate leadership that we need. |
| 0:56.7 | Also training an exceedingly cool horse. I definitely got Olympics fever this year watching Simone Biles win yet another three gold medals. |
| 1:07.5 | And I've also been on a hard journey with my dad through hospice. |
| 1:13.4 | So, you know, all the things. |
| 1:16.5 | Yeah, life can be like that, right? |
| 1:18.0 | The highs and the lows all at once. |
| 1:20.3 | And I guess that might make sense for why we haven't released an episode for a year. |
| 1:24.7 | Yeah, we've been doing a lot. |
| 1:26.7 | And that's part of why we've been pretty |
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