At a press briefing on Wednesday the U.S. special presidential envoy for climate, John Kerry, caught the ire of Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) and Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR).
Kerry defended the Biden Administration's plan to combat climate change and answered questions regarding the administration's attitude towards fossil fuels.
Kerry told reporters:
“With respect to those workers, no two people are more, in this room, are more concerned about it. And the president of the United States has expressed in every comment he has made about climate the need to grow the new jobs that pay better, that are cleaner. You know, you look at the consequences of black lung for a miner, for instance, and measure that against the fastest growing job in the United States before COVID was solar power technician. The same people can do those jobs, but the choice of doing the solar power one now is a better choice. Similarly, you have the second fastest growing job pre-COVID was wind turbine technician. So what President Biden wants to do is make sure those folks have better choices, that they have alternatives, that they can be the people that go to work to make the solar panels, that we’re making them here at home.”
Rep. Dan Crenshaw and Sen. Tom Cotton took exception to Kerry’s comments and decided to respond via Twitter. Crenshaw tweeted Wednesday that he believes solar jobs are paid 20K less than oil and gas jobs.
John Kerry - worth hundreds of millions - telling blue-collar workers to just “go to work to make the solar panels.”
— Dan Crenshaw (@DanCrenshawTX) January 27, 2021
By the way, solar will pay on average $20K less than oil and gas jobs.
John Kerry thinks you should just shutup and accept it.
No. https://t.co/eyWx6Q7cbr
Cotton took a different approach, instead calling out Kerry for his lavish lifestyle and large carbon footprint.
John Kerry—who flies in private jets, owned a 76-foot yacht and several mansions—has the carbon footprint of a small nation.
— Tom Cotton (@TomCottonAR) January 27, 2021
Yet he tells energy workers to "make solar panels" when the Biden administration kills their jobs. pic.twitter.com/QhK2FVykxU