As showdown looms, Tom Steyer airs TV ad ripping oil industry in California
By David Siders and Jim Miller, Sacramento Bee.
With an end-of-session brawl looming in the Legislature over California climate programs, billionaire environmentalist Tom Steyer on Monday will start airing a television ad accusing the state’s oil industry of putting profits over the health of children.
The ad, released on the day lawmakers return from their summer recess, comes amid wavering support for extending the state’s cap-and-trade program, in which polluters pay to offset carbon emissions.
Gov. Jerry Brown, who is trying to reach an agreement with lawmakers by the end of August to extend the program beyond 2020, said last week that he will “get it one way or the other” while acknowledging he is “still working” on a plan to extend the landmark program.