Dem Senate candidate's ad depicts apocalyptic climate future with 127 degree temperatures
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}A new campaign ad from Colorado Democrat Andrew Romanoff shows a little girl complaining about climate change in a "not so distant future" where her family has to block out the sun and hide from extreme temperatures.
"What I miss most is the sunshine," a young girl says in the ad. The video, released on Monday, shows a man in a hazmat suit blocking out the sunlight in what appears to be an underground shelter for the girl and her family. It's part of Romanoff's Senate bid, which he portrayed as a challenge to establishment Democrats who weren't tough enough on climate change.
The fictional scene involves a radio broadcast reporting that the temperature is 127 degrees Fahrenheit and the air quality index is 420 -- well within the hazardous range for pollution.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}"This place makes me sad," the girl adds, before adding that her baby brother will be born into a world that's "not safe for him." "Anybody out there ... do not go outside," the radio broadcast adds. The ad appears to suggest the girl's parents "fight a lot" because of climate change -- an apparent reference to claims that the atmospheric phenomenon increases the chance of domestic violence.
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At the end of the scene, Romanoff warns: "This is not the stuff of fiction or some far off threat." During an interview about the ad, Romanoff suggested some people were already living in a "hellscape" from climate change.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Romanoff, who previously served as Colorado's House Speaker, appeared to pan media coverage of his ad, pointing to an article that asked if his portrayal was "good politics."
He also took a shot at former Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper who ran for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination, urging moderation among a wave of more progressive candidates.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}"The press (like Hickenlooper) has ignored most of the #cosen debates, preferring the horse race & the money chase to the content of this campaign. You won’t find our platform in the news," he tweeted.
Sen. Cory Gardner, R-Colo., who Romanoff is trying to unseat, mocked the ad on Monday.
"This ad is insane. Can someone check on Andrew Romanoff?" he tweeted.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Monday's ad was just the latest of heated rhetoric surrounding climate change as the nation approaches the 2020 elections. Climate activists have been demanding bolder reforms as leading Democrats express skepticism over the political viability of plans like the Green New Deal pushed by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y.
Both House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., have put the kibosh on something that ambitious -- provoking criticism from activists like Romanoff. Romanoff's ad specifically shows Feinstein dismissing a request to consider the Green New Deal, saying it wouldn't pass the Senate. When the Senate voted on a Green New Deal resolution in 2019, it failed in what many Democrats described as a sham vote.
The 2020 elections, Romanoff says, are perhaps the "last-in-a-lifetime chance rescue the world we know and the hopes of billions not yet born."
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"We can squander that chance on business as usual," he said, before showing clips of Hickenlooper, President Trump, and Gardner. The potential race between Gardner and Romanoff would likely be just one of many that highlight climate change in 2020.
The Sunrise Movement, allied with Ocasio-Cortez, recently released a list of insurgent candidates it sought to have challenge incumbent Democrats who were purportedly too moderate on the issue.