Climate Cabinet Score: Background

We can’t address the climate crisis without state leadership.
States have enormous decision-making power over energy, transportation, buildings, industry, land use, environmental justice, climate resilience, and more.  

We need our state legislators to be fighting for a just and equitable clean energy transition. But with thousands of state legislators and hundreds of policy battles unfolding across the US, it’s hard to know how to engage. At Climate Cabinet Action, we needed a tool to help us see the bigger picture and direct strategic action. That's why we started centralizing climate votes and building a climate scorecard for ourselves. Now, we’re excited to share it with you. 

The Climate Cabinet Scorecard is the first national tool to hold state legislators accountable for their climate votes. It's designed to bring transparency to the climate votes of state legislators across the US — and build momentum for bold climate action everywhere. Check out the scorecard homepage.

Methodology

The Climate Cabinet Score tells you how often every state legislator in the US votes for or against climate action. If a legislator has a Climate Cabinet Score of A+, they voted pro-climate every time a climate bill came up for a floor vote. A Climate Cabinet Score of F- means that the legislator voted anti-climate at every opportunity.

The Climate Cabinet Score considers legislators' floor votes on important climate and environmental bills. With a strong belief that local organizers know their states the best, we compiled our bill list using publicly available scorecards and legislative guides from leading state-based partners. Each environmental bill is scored once, and each “climate” bill is given double weight.

Legislators in each state considered vastly different climate and environmental bills, and faced different political situations. For this reason, scores should be considered within the context of each state — not compared across state lines.

Credits and Thanks

The national Climate Cabinet Scorecard would not be possible without the advocacy work and bill tracking undertaken by countless state-based organizations and local partners, including affiliates of League of Conservation Voters, the Sierra Club, Clean Water Action, Environment America, and others. We’re grateful and indebted to this critical state-based work. 

Next Steps

Of course, floor votes alone do not show the whole picture, and the ambition of climate bills considered varies widely from state to state. We're excited to continue building upon these scores to capture additional nuance in future years.

If you have information on a state not listed here or want to help us capture a more detailed snapshot of your state in future updates —  please, reach out!