Camila Thorndike, a top Harris-Walz campaign climate adviser, abruptly walked back her recent comments stating that Vice President Kamala Harris would be hostile to future oil and gas drilling as president—effectively reversing her reversal of the candidate's position.
In a statement Monday, Thorndike lamented that she wasn't clear enough when she told Politico last week that Harris is not "promoting expansion" of oil drilling and suggested Harris was not fond of a provision in the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act mandating fossil fuel leases. Thorndike serves as Harris's "climate engagement director."
"I didn't explain myself clearly here," Thorndike said Monday. "Contrary to Trump's claims, the VP has not banned fracking, doesn't support banning fracking, and in fact cast the tie-breaking vote on the biggest pro-climate law ever, which, yes, opened new fracking leases. People know that's her position." ...
It remains unclear how Thorndike's new statement clarifies her comments from last week.
More.
It's hard to run away from a former position which had no nuance.
Harris was, and remains, an extreme opponent of fossil fuels, a Kool-Aid drinker like Hillary Clinton who thought you could mandate solar panels on every home in the United States.
More importantly, her political support comes from the extreme opponents of fossil fuels, and they have to be assuaged as Harris runs away from them in order to win in pro-fracking Pennsylvania, at whom the Monday statement was aimed.
Harris' climate adviser is being forced by the campaign to say words she doesn't want to say.
