FIVE QUESTIONS

with Deb Callahan

Deb Callahan is Executive Director of the League of Conservation Voters, the electoral arm of the American environmental movement.

 

 

Q: You were hired to run the LCV in early 1996. What's changed on the national political scene since then?

A: That's a good question. It's really rather breathtaking. Think of the sea change over the last eighteen months.

In early 1996 we were all weathering the 104th Congress assault on environmental laws. Newt Gingrich had a firm grip, politically and ideologically, on the reins of power in the House. Bob Dole was a lame duck Senate leader trying to exert influence. Bill Clinton and Al Gore were just beginning to rally rebuffs to a host of right wing proposals (although they screwed up bigtime on the timber salvage rider).

Today the Congress is more stealthy (though the assaults continue). Newt Gingrich's speakership is on life support, and it's unclear whether rank-and-file House Republicans intend to pull the plug. Bob Dole is promoting consumer products while Trent Lott consolidates his power. The President and Vice President have made some good tough calls, particularly on Clean Air Act. We're watching to see whether they follow suit on other important matters: climate change, endangered species, public lands in Alaska, Utah, Florida.

In the 1996 elections a number of anti-environmentalists were defeated in campaigns that highlighted their poor voting records on our issues. Both Democratic and Republican pollsters are recognizing the power of the environmental issue among the electorate. Environment has emerged as an important electoral issue. We'll be looking for more "greenscamming", our term for misrepresenting an anti-environmental voting record.

 

Q: And what's changed at LCV?

A: In the '94 elections, too many good environmentalist Members of Congress lost their seats in an historic landslide. In response, LCV decided to significantly change our tactics and strategies. We decided to adopt more aggressive campaign-style programs to respond in kind to the new anti-environmentalism. I like to say that we've made the transition from being essentially a "political" organization to a "campaign" organization.

What does that mean? We continue to produce the National Environmental Scorecard that rates all members of congress on key environmental votes. And we will always endorse the best pro-environmental candidates running for federal office and make financial contributions to support good candidates. But now we've added a few new slingshots to our arsenal because the political game is being played differently these days.

There are four kinds of power in politics: money, ideas, influence and votes. LCV used to primarily rely on our money -- campaign contributions plus scorecards and endorsements. But our financial resources are only a fraction of the megabucks that anti-environmental PACs can muster. We decided to significantly change our priorities.

We chose to shift our power from being money-based to being votes-and-ideas-based. After all, environmentalism is a popular movement anchored by millions of Americans. We realized that we had to wage public campaigns to educate voters about the real records of their elected officials. It's really pretty basic: when voters have access to candidates' environmental records, especially on issues with local impact, they tend to vote for the environmentalist and (even more strongly) against the anti-environmentalist.

So LCV adopted the Dirty Dozen campaign as our centerpiece effort. Each election cycle we target twelve of the worst -- and most vulnerable -- anti-environmentalists in the country. In 1996 we spent a campaign budget of about $1.5 million on television and radio spots, grassroots organizers, direct mail, polls and all the other elements you use to educate and motivate the public. Come election day, seven of the Dirty Dozen were defeated, and Stan Greenberg's post-election analysis says that we were more effective than we dreamed.

On the positive side of the ledger, we also ran an Earth List program to support ten of the best environmental candidates, also vulnerable. We raised about $360,000 in contributions for those races, and all ten were elected.

But let me tell you, there's just an enormous way to go before we have a solid pro-environment majority on Capitol Hill. So LCV is working on a richer war chest,we're putting together an aggressive media and political staff, and we're doing lots to reach out to the grassroots -- the real power in American politics.

 

Q: You mentioned the business of coming up with a scorecard of key legislative votes to determine the environmental acceptability of Members of Congress. What new issues will be on that list in 1998? What issues might get dropped?

A: Right. What we call the National Environmental Scorecard has become something like LCV's trademark publication. For each session of Congress, we "grade" Senators and Representatives on their votes for or against the environment. This can be pretty daunting. Luckily, we can count on the leaders of about 30 different conservation organizations to help us determine which votes are the most significant. As a group, we evaluate all the environmental votes cast in both houses, and then boil them down to a key dozen or so. By keeping the Scorecard a group effort, we make it a consensus document of the whole environmental movement.

The Scorecard is limited to issues that Congress has actually voted on. Typically they fall into a few broad categories: wildlife, parks and forests; energy; pollution and public health; international population planning. Early on in this current 105th Congress, the silence on the Hill was so deafening that we wondered if there would be any environmental votes at all. The leadership seemed politically intimidated. But things have heated up over the summer. There have been some major fights: on the "Pave the Parks" right-of-way rider; on attempts to weaken the Endangered Species Act; and on logging road construction in the National Forests. All of these issues definitely merit consideration for Scorecard inclusion. We're also keeping a close eye on the new Clean Air Act standards, on so-called "regulatory reform," on forest management , and on reauthorizations of important laws like Superfund and the federal transportation bill. And then there's utility restructuring and the international negotiations on climate change.

 

Q: Talk to us about the Republican Party and environmentalism. Specifically, what are the chances of a GOP/green alliance to eliminate environmentally-harmful federal subsidies?

A: The environment never used to be treated as a partisan issue. Republicans have been indispensable to environmental protection, from Theodore Roosevelt to Richard Nixon. Usually environmental battle lines were drawn by region, not party.

Even after the Reagan Revolution, environmentalists could count on leadership from moderate Republicans like Sherwood Boehlert, Chris Shays, Jim Jeffords and others. It was only when the extreme right-wing of the party took control of the Congressional leadership that environmental politics and policy went haywire. I mean, Tom DeLay!

In 1995, when DeLay and his partners pushed hard for an anti-green agenda, the majority of congressional Republicans started to backpedal on their environmental commitments. They seemed ready enough to scrap decades of progress by throwing out important regulations and safeguards. But in doing so, they misrepresented the Republican rank and file, which still strongly supported conservation and public health regs.

So it was kind of ironic.The Republican leadership in the 104th congress spearheaded the worst legislative record since LCV started keeping tallies -- there were 135 perfect "zeroes" on our Scorecard in the first session alone. But the voters, including Republican voters, were telling pollsters that they wanted environmental laws with clout.

The '96 election was an eye-opener for many Republican officeholders. Suddenly they were faced with the fact that people didn't appreciate the rollback attempts. In fact, the environment was often cited as a principal reason that many voters favored Democratic challengers over Republican incumbents in 1996.

As far as a GOP/green alliance is concerned-- some Republicans, both moderates and conservatives, have taken leadership roles this year sponsoring amendments to cut environmentally destructive spending. This type of "Green Scissors" effort is a good first step. There is intellectual common ground between fiscal conservatives and conservationists on policies like logging road subsidies, pork barrel water projects, and tax breaks for unsustainable industries. There's lots of work remaining to be done.

 

Q: Are you having fun yet?

A: Are you kidding? I have the best job in the environmental movement -- holding politicians accountable, calling it like I see it, fighting fights where you know when you win and when you lose, playing at sophisticated, hard-hitting campaigns. I love it. The people I interact with every day are incredibly interesting. After all, my career is to practice politics to protect the environment. I'd say I've found a niche. I'd like to occupy it for a long time.

 

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