WASHINGTON — Senator Kamala Harris of California released an ambitious new climate change plan early Wednesday, calling for $10 trillion in spending over a decade to combat human-driven global warming and a new tax or fee on companies that emit greenhouse pollution.
Ms. Harris unveiled her plan hours before a CNN town-hall-style event on global warming, which 10 Democratic candidates are scheduled to attend — the first time in a presidential campaign that the question of what to do about the heating planet has merited its own major forum on prime-time television.
Ms. Harris’s announcement also came one day after three other candidates released climate plans,ncluding Senator Elizabeth Warrenof Massachusetts, a leading rival for the nomination.
Ms. Harris, a former California attorney general, styled herself as a uniquely qualified prosecutor-in-chief who would maximize the power of the legal system to penalize corporate polluters and deliver “climate justice” to poor communities that suffer disproportionately from the impacts of climate change, like flooding, heat waves and food and water shortages.
Political analysts cited the sudden rush of new plans before the CNN event as evidence that the issue has gained significant traction on the national stage. Over the past year, multiple scientific reports have concluded thatlimate change has already led to dangerous outcomes for humanity, and toevere costs to the American economy, including more powerful hurricanes, stronger droughts and spreading fires.
As the candidates headed to the forum in New York on Wednesday,urricane Dorian was lashing Floridafter inflicting devastating damage to the Bahamas, where at least seven people have been killed in the storm.
Ms. Harris initially declined an invitation to the forum, citing a scheduling conflict, buter campaign later reversed that decisions criticism mounted from some environmental groups.