Republicans for Environmental Protection Condemns Sierra Club's Misleading Attacks on McCain

February 28, 2008

The Sierra Club's leaders have distorted Senator John McCain's environmental record with a deliberate campaign of misleading, over-the-top attacks, Republicans for Environmental Protection (REP), a national grassroots conservation organization, said today.

"We are greatly disappointed that the leaders of one of America's great conservation organizations has soiled its legacy by stooping to a partisan smear campaign against Senator McCain's record and good name," REP President Martha Marks said. "The recent barrage of inflammatory rhetoric distorting the Senator's environmental record should dispel any pretense that the leaders of the Sierra Club are non-partisan."

Over the past two weeks, the Sierra Club has issued two press releases and sent at least four emails to its members attacking Senator McCain. The barrage has falsely equated votes missed as a result of the demands of the senator's presidential campaign as reflecting "a history of siding with polluters and special interests." Nothing could be further from the truth.

"Senator McCain has a record of taking on hard issues, fighting special interests, bucking party leaders, and doing what's right regardless of the political consequences," said REP Government Affairs Director David Jenkins.

"The Sierra Club appears to have let blind partisanship trump honest advocacy," Jenkins added. "I find it particularly telling that the Sierra Club's attacks started at the same time that Senator McCain wrapped up the Republican nomination."

Senator McCain has a long record of environmental accomplishments. His leadership on the climate change issue is unequaled by any of the other presidential candidates. In addition, he has consistently opposed drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, championed legislation to protect the Grand Canyon from overflight noise, led efforts to reform the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and has been instrumental in bipartisan efforts to designate millions of acres of wilderness.

A check into the Sierra Club's press releases over the past year shows no similar attacks on Senator Barack Obama for sponsoring an industry-backed bill providing incentives for liquefied coal, or for his vote with the barge industry opposing the McCain-sponsored amendment to require independent screening of Army Corps of Engineers water projects, which often are both costly and environmentally harmful.

"Over the years, we have fought alongside the Sierra Club on a host of environmental issues. We have repeatedly defended the club against charges of partisanship. But these scurrilous assaults on Senator McCain--who espouses the conservation ethic of Theodore Roosevelt--are indefensible," said REP Policy Director Jim DiPeso.

"Having both a Republican and Democratic nominee for president who are good on the environment presents a great opportunity to make environmental issues more bipartisan," DiPeso added, "which makes it all the more disappointing that the Sierra Club has chosen instead to perpetuate the polarized atmosphere that has so often hurt our cause."

"Every candidate for president should have his or her environmental record held up to scrutiny, but these swift boat-type partisan attacks are irresponsible and unbecoming of an organization that gave America such great conservation statesmen as John Muir and David Brower," Marks said.


Additional Resources:

REP Letter to Sierra Club President Carl Pope and League of Conservation Voters President Gene Karpinski

Senator McCain's Environmental Accomplishments

Sierra Club email alerts sent to its members