Exchange Between Vance and Walz Shows Gulf on Climate Change Views

The devastation that Hurricane Helene wreaked across the South last week thrust the issue of climate change to the forefront of the vice-presidential debate early in its first hour, quickly demonstrating how the two major parties diverge when it comes to the threat posed by climate change.

Senator JD Vance of Ohio, former President Donald J. Trump’s running mate, said that people were “justifiably worried about all these crazy weather patterns,” a position that might seem at odds with his running mate, who recently called the focus on the environment “one of the greatest scams.” But Mr. Vance dismissed as “weird science” those who say that carbon emissions are causing climate change.

He added that he and Mr. Trump wanted “the environment to be cleaner and safer.” And he said the climate crisis would be solved by growing American manufacturing.

“You’d want to reassure as much American manufacturing as possible, and you’d want to produce as much energy as possible in the United States of America, because we’re the cleanest economy in the entire world,” Mr. Vance said, asserting that overseas manufacturing and energy production had a greater carbon footprint.

The United Nations has said that “the manufacturing industry is one of the largest contributors to greenhouse gas emissions worldwide.”

Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota, Vice President Kamala Harris’s running mate, responded by noting that in the past Mr. Trump had called climate change a “hoax,” before pivoting to policies passed by the Biden administration.

Mr. Walz called Mr. Vance’s depiction of manufacturing a “false choice” and pointed to the Inflation Reduction Act, saying that investments in electric vehicles and solar energy had resulted in new U.S. jobs.

“We are seeing us