Bernie Sanders attacks Clinton's climate plan: 'Not enough'

Sen. Bernie Sanders sees a big gaping hole in Hillary Clinton’s newly released climate-change proposals: the Keystone pipeline.

“It is hard for me to understand how one can be concerned about climate change but not vigorously oppose the Keystone pipeline,” Sanders, who is challenging Clinton for the Democratic presidential nomination, said in a statement released on Tuesday.


The statement came in response to Clinton being asked during a town-hall event in New Hampshire about her thoughts on the pipeline. Clinton demurred when asked.

“This is President Obama’s decision and I’m not going to second-guess him because I was in a position to set this in motion and I do not think that would be the right thing to do,” Clinton said.

That response and Sanders’ attack came a day after the former secretary of state and Democratic frontrunner unveiled her ambitious set of goals for the environment. Clinton proposed a goal of producing a third of the nation’s electricity from renewable energy from 2027 as well as installing 500 million solar panels by 2020.

That wasn’t enough for Sanders, who said her proposals were a good idea but “not enough.”

“We must make significant reductions in carbon emissions and break our dependency on fossil fuels,” Sanders said. “That is why I have helped lead the fight in the Senate against the Keystone pipeline, which would transport some of the dirtiest fossil fuel in the world.”