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Thursday, May 18th, 2023

New Montana Law Bans Agencies From Considering Climate Impacts in Analyses

Author:     Sharon Zhang
Source:     truthout
Publication Date:     May 17, 2023
 Link: New Montana Law Bans Agencies From Considering Climate Impacts in Analyses
Stephan:  

The people of Montana chose MAGAt Republicans to govern them, and now they are going to live with the consequences, and they are not going to like it. I predict that over the next five years we are going to see a lot of whining from Red state voters who voted for Republicans as their state is caught unprepared as the climate worsens. It is impossible to vote Republican and be an ethical person who supports fostering social wellbeing.

Montana MAGAt Republican Governor Greg Gianforte inspects the wreckage of a crash that killed four airmen at 8,500 feet on Emigrant Peak in Emigrant, Montana. Credit: William Campbell / Getty

Montana is now home to one of the most extremist anti-climate, pro-fossil fuel and big developer laws in the country after Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte signed a GOP-sponsored bill banning agencies from considering climate impacts in major project analyses last week.

H.B. 971, which passed both chambers of the state legislature largely by party lines last month, bans agencies like the Montana Department of Environmental Quality from considering greenhouse gas emissions and climate impacts both inside and outside of the state when conducting analyses of large projects like coal mines and power plants.

The new law severely undercuts environmental analyses as a major tool of the climate movement, and, as Inside Climate News writes, is one of the most aggressive anti-climate laws in the country. The bill had garnered widespread opposition from the public with more than 1,000 public comments, 95 percent of which were submitted to oppose the proposal, per the Montana Free Press.

“Our […]

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