Hillary Clinton mocked the extremism of environmentalists promoting a “keep it in the ground” energy strategy during a September 2015 meeting with trade unions. The transcript of Clinton’s remarks appeared in the leaked emails of John Podesta which have been published this week by Wikileaks. From Politico:

“I’m already at odds with the most organized and wildest” of the environmental movement, Clinton told building trades unions in September 2015, according to a transcript of the remarks apparently circulated by her aides. “They come to my rallies and they yell at me and, you know, all the rest of it. They say, ‘Will you promise never to take any fossil fuels out of the earth ever again?’ No. I won’t promise that. Get a life, you know.”… In her speech to the unions, she took aim at that emerging “keep it in the ground” strategy. “They are after everything and I’m just talking through them. And of course they go support somebody else,” she said, according to the transcript. “That’s fine and I don’t particularly care. But I do think I have to say, look, given everything else we have to do in this country, this is not an issue for me that I’m going to say I support. I want to work on other stuff.”

The “keep it in the ground” campaign is a relatively recent effort by leading environmentalist groups like Greenpeace, the Sierra Club and 350.org to argue for shutting down the mining of coal as well as drilling for gas and oil.

Wikileaks published another email in which John Podesta complains he is being “f**ked” by Tom Steyer, the billionaire environmentalist. Steyer had set up a litmus test candidates would need to meet in order to receive money from his PAC. He wanted candidates to sign on to an effort to move the nation to 100% renewable energy by 2050 and 50% by 2030.

“I am deep in the middle of dealing with getting f—ed by the NYT, but I didn’t expect to get f—ed by you in the NYT. Thanks a lot for jumping us. I hope President Bush helps you reach your climate goals,” John Podesta wrote in the July 2015 message to Steyer, referring to the candidacy of Jeb Bush.

Clearly, Hillary is not as far left on this issue as some leading environmentalists would like her to be. Given the influence these groups wield on the left, she is going to have to address her opposition to “keep it in the ground” at some point and probably try to smooth over her “get a life” comment.