At a summer town hall in a Downey fire station, Congressman Robert Garcia declined to take a more active approach to mitigate climate change.

In response to the question “What is your agenda to fight climate change in Congress?” Garcia said “I’m not sure that I personally have an agenda, except for I support the broader agenda that the President has put in place.”

Biden’s climate approach has faced strong criticism, including for his opening of the Willow oil project in Alaska, which is now facing a lawsuit from environmental groups.

After voicing his support for Biden’s approach, Garcia then went off into discussing that communities like Downey would be most impacted by heat islands, with “impacts especially to seniors or folks who may not have access to air conditioning, or to being able to be in a place that is cool.” He did not outline any policy proposals to help seniors and others in such situations.

He then discussed the Inflation Reduction Act, electrification, solar power, off-shore wind generation, and electric vehicles, trucks, and ships. “So right now, as far as this region, one of the biggest things that we can do is provide electric opportunities for folks to deal with the major issues that happen around climate.”

Carlos Ovalle, a long-time critic of Garcia, said “Garcia’s neoliberal solution to any problem is to buy more shit from those who, like Elon Musk, have no interest in anything but their pockets. That any of this is seen as ‘pro-environment’ by Garcia and his ilk is purely coincidental… and convenient.”

Ovalle also placed Garcia’s “solution” in a broader context: “Garcia and other fake environmentalists push consumers to buy electric vehicles, push the goods transporation industry to buy electric trucks, push homeowners to buy power packs to go along with their solar panels. What they don’t tell us is that these all rely on lithium batteries which depend largely on strip mining, destruction of habitat, and poor working conditions for the miners, all of which inevitably lead to regime change for foreign governments that would prefer to have none of the above.”

Notably, Garcia ignored protestors outside of the event, who held a sign saying “Nationalize the Energy Industry.” Neither Biden nor Garcia have endorsed nationalization, which would allow the federal government to take robust action to mitigate greenhouse gases.

Red Star Report at KPFP interviewed one of the protestors who said, “We’re here to call Robert out. He’s done so many bad things in Long Beach and now he’s in Congress. The people need to know, we can’t vote for this crook. He’s done so many bad things. He took bus routes away, so how are people who can’t afford to Uber getting to work? Robert Garcia took a lot of developer money and he’s making things affordable only for people who make over $100,000.”

The protestors outside were joined by other protestors who held signs inside the event, focusing on Garcia’s record of supporting the billions of dollars going to fund the Ukraine war. One protester, Juan Martinez, delegate for the 64th District, made a series of demands from Garcia, saying “We have people dying every day, and I want you to stop funding wars in Ukraine and all around the Earth.”

Garcia is expected to face mounting criticism as he continues to tie himself to President Biden, who is facing historically low polling numbers, partly because of his broken campaign promises—both in terms of the climate and economic opportunities for working-class families.