Democrats and climate groups ‘too polite’ in fight against ‘malevolent’ fossil fuel giants, says key senator

Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island gives 300th climate speech on the US Senate floor

The Democratic party and the climate movement have been too cautious and polite" and should instead be denouncing the fossil fuel industry's huge denial operation", the US senator Sheldon Whitehouse said.

The fossil fuel industry has run the biggest and most malevolent propaganda operation the country has ever seen," the Rhode Island Democrat said in an interview Monday with the global media collaboration Covering Climate Now. It is defending a $700-plus billion [annual] subsidy" of not being charged for the health and environmental damages caused by burning fossil fuels. I think the more people understand that, the more they'll be irate [that] they've been lied to." But, he added, Democrats have not done a good job of calling that out."