Josh Siegel reports for the Washington Examiner on a Republican group that’s touting a new federal carbon tax.
A Republican-backed group pushing for Congress to pass a federal carbon tax launched a six-figure advertising campaign on Wednesday.
The campaign from the Americans for Carbon Dividends represents a new and more public phase in its advocacy campaign to promote its plan, which features a carbon tax that would return the revenue to taxpayers.
“The objective is to target D.C. thought leaders and influencers on why a carbon tax and dividend is the right climate solution that all sides can support,” said former Rep. Ryan Costello, a Pennsylvania Republican and managing director of Americans for Carbon Dividends, the advocacy arm of the Climate Leadership Council, a group led by former Republican Secretaries of State James Baker III and George Shultz.
“The public advocacy piece of this is a way to test the political theory that this is an implementable and workable plan that is attractive to a bipartisan coalition,” Costello told the Washington Examiner.
Americans for Carbon Dividends will indefinitely run the 30-second ad, titled “All Sides Win,” in the D.C. market on platforms including Fox News, the Wall Street Journal, and the Washington Post and on social media sites YouTube, Twitter, and Facebook, in addition to Hulu.
The Climate Leadership Council’s proposal would impose a gradually rising carbon tax beginning at $40 per ton, increasing 5% every year, and return the money to American people through equal quarterly payments to offset higher energy prices. A family of four would receive roughly $2,000 per year in dividends, the group said.
