Schumer vows to take 63 million gas-powered cars off the road as part of climate plan

WASHINGTON --- Charles Schumer, the top Senate Democrat, is rolling out a plan to spend billions of dollars to spur American drivers to buy electric and other low-emissions vehicles.

The proposal, released late Thursday, is a signal that establishment Democrats are heeding calls from the party's activist base to go on offense on the issue of climate change after years of little action from the Senate under both Republican and Democratic leaders.

And it is squarely aimed at what is now the biggest source of carbon dioxide emissions in the United States - the transportation sector, which recently surpassed power plants as the nation's biggest contributor of greenhouse gases.

"This proposal to bring clean cars to all of America will be a key component of the far-reaching climate legislation from Senate Democrats, and I'm proud it has a broad coalition of support," Schumer, D-N.Y., said in a statement.

The success of proposals such as Schumer's will determine whether the United States can curtail the nation's contributions to climate change and help forestall further warming that scientists from around the world consider dangerous. Schumer's office estimates its plan would take 63 million gasoline-powered cars off the road by 2030.

But it comes with a big price tag: $392 billion over 10 years.

The plan is essentially "Cash for Clunkers" on steroids, harking back to an early Obama administration scrappage program that encouraged motorists to trade in older cars for newer and more fuel-efficient vehicles.

Under the program, car owners who trade in a gasoline-powered vehicle for a new plug-in electric, plug-in hybrid, or hydrogen fuel-cell car will get a rebate starting at $3,000, potentially going up by thousands of dollars the farther a vehicle can go without recharging. In many instances, that rebate would far exceed the existing $7,500 tax credit for electric vehicles.

The plan, which doesn't have any legislative text yet, would also give another $45 billion in funding to states and cities to install charging stations and other infrastructure. It would also dedicate $17 billion to two grant programs to build new factories for electric vehicles and to remodel factories that make cars with internal-combustion engines or parts for them.

"You might object: Isn't the transition to electric vehicles already happening?" Schumer writes in a New York Times op-ed announcing his plan. "Yes, but it is progressing too slowly."

Schumer's ideas stand virtually no chance of becoming law with Republicans in control of the Senate and President Trump in the White House. But the plan is part of a promise the senator from New York is making to bring major climate legislation to the Senate floor should Democrats win the chamber in the 2020 election and he be chosen by his peers as majority leader.

Schumer's low-emission vehicle proposal has the support of traditional Democratic allies who often don't see eye-to-eye on environmental and labor issues but can bring lobbying might to enacting this plan.

Backers include the United Auto Workers, the major union representing automotive employees, as well as the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers; the carmakers General Motors and Ford Motor Co., both of which are heavily investing in electric vehicles; and several major green groups, including the League of Conservation Voters and the Natural Resources Defense Council.

The proposal, said Gary Jones, president of the United Auto Workers, "honors the sweat and sacrifice of American autoworkers by investing in domestic manufacturing."

Tiernan Sittenfeld, senior vice president for government affairs for the League of Conservation Voters, noted that Congress has some history of passing clean-car legislation on a bipartisan basis. In 2007, for example, a Democratic-led Congress and President George W. Bush together raised fuel efficiency standards for cars.

"We'd love to see a redux of that," she said.

But more recent proposals to prop up the sale of electric vehicles have faced stiff opposition this Congress from the oil industry, which makes the gasoline that runs the engines dominating roadways, as well as politicians from petroleum-producing states.

Over the past year, oil lobbyists and conservative allies sustained an intense lobbying battle against the extension of existing electric vehicle tax credits, which have expired for Tesla and GM cars and will whittle away for several more makes in coming years.

"The EV tax credit has served its purpose," Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), chair of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, wrote in a letter this month in opposition to extension of the tax break. "Over one million EVs are currently on America's roads."

One point of criticism he and other critics raise is that the vast majority of the tax credits are scooped up by those making more than $100,000 a year.

In an apparent effort to address that discrepancy, Schumer's proposal gives low-income drivers an extra cash incentive for buying either new or used low-emissions vehicles.

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