Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s Green New Deal Is Finally Getting the Support It Needs

In a perfect world, the United States would be a country that supports good-paying jobs, a fair-and-balanced economy, protection of our environment, and proper education and healthcare. It may sound like an unreachable goal, especially in our unstable political climate, but thanks to a young and robust group, including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, American citizens can get there. Changing the country may seem like an ambitious goal, and the Green New Deal is where it all starts.

The Green New Deal focuses on the environment and job creation, which would in turn trickle down to other areas including a fair-and-balanced economy, justice, education, and more. Many politicians have discussed the Green New Deal in the past; however, nothing concrete has come from the proposal until now.

Sunrise — an organization that has been advocating for the Green New Deal for a couple of years — is finally seeing support for their cause in large part because Ocasio-Cortez is now the leader of the movement. In her first week as a Congresswoman, Ocasio-Cortez was asked to support an event they were organizing and now has become the face of the campaign. Through her determined push, more and more Democratic lawmakers are starting to support a proposal for the Green New Deal.

This week Ocasio-Cortez sent a letter to her colleagues explaining the details of the Green New Deal and asking for their support. Here’s some of what her letter said: “Next week, we plan to release a resolution that outlines the scope and scale of the Green New Deal,” Bloomberg reports. “In it, we call for a national, social, industrial and economic mobilization at a scale not seen since World War II.” Some of the goals that Ocasio-Cortez outlined in the letter include “reaching net-zero greenhouse gas emissions ‘through a fair and just transition for all communities and workers,’ creating millions of ‘good, high-wage jobs’ while ensuring prosperity and economic security for all, and investment in infrastructure and industry.”

The Green New Deal also calls for “clean air and water, climate resiliency, healthy food, access to nature and ‘a sustainable environment for all for generations to come,'” and to “promote justice and equity by preventing current and repairing historic oppression to frontline and vulnerable communities.” She concluded by saying that these goals could happen through a 10-year plan of industrial and infrastructure projects.

Backers of the Green New Deal include Sen. Edward Markey, Rep. Brendan Boyle, Rep. Joaquin Castro, Rep. Yvette Clarke, Rep. Pramila Jayapal, Rep. Ro Khanna, Rep. Ted Lieu, Rep Joe Neguse, and Rep. Ayanna Pressley. According to Axios, other groups are supportive of the deal as well, including the Sierra Club and Tom Steyer’s NextGen America, and possibly (depending on the final language of the proposal) the Service Employees International Union, Working Families Party, People’s Action, Center for Popular Democracy, Justice First, Green For All, 350.org, CREDO Action, the Sunrise Movement and Justice Democrats.

Click here if you’d like to learn more about the Green New Deal.