Photo by Josh Deware WHEN MY FAMILY and I were canvassing for California congressional candidate Jessica Morse in 2018, the first doorbell we rang was answered by a man who said through his screen door, “I want you to know that I voted for Trump.” “Oh my God!” mouthed my five-year-old daughter with an exaggerated stage whisper. Then he said, “But I’m really not happy with what he’s doing with the environment.” 

No matter how intractable our differences may seem, almost everyone in this country values clean air and water. By talking to people about why these issues matter to us, we can connect with voters who may initially seem unpersuadable. In the end, that Trump voter committed to voting for Morse, who ran on protecting public lands, reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and investing in clean energy jobs.

Between now and November, you can make those kinds of conversations happen through texts, phone calls, or letters—or, if it’s safe in your area, by talking face mask to face mask. And I hope you will.

This may be the most consequential election of our lives, and not just because of Donald Trump. Our country will be facing crises on multiple fronts. We’ll be struggling to recover from the health and economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic; this is especially true for the Black, Latino, and Indigenous communities that have lost so many loved ones to the virus. We’ll be in the midst of a climate emergency that disproportionately harms those same communities. We’ll still have a crisis of police brutality: If trends continue, police will be killing three people every day, most of them Black, Indigenous, or other people of color. And we’ll still have devastating racial gaps in everything from household wealth to maternal health.

Illustration by Cat O'Neil Joe Biden is the person to lead us out of these crises—in part because he’s done it before. He spearheaded the Obama administration’s response to the 2008 financial crisis, creating millions of good jobs through investments in renewable energy and infrastructure. 

Biden understands that solving the climate crisis represents an opportunity to rebuild our economy in a way that works for everyone. Yes, he’ll rejoin the Paris Agreement and reinstate environmental protections overturned by Trump. But he also plans to leverage trillions in federal investments to rebuild our middle class and create family-sustaining jobs in clean energy and infrastructure. He is ready to take bold, unprecedented steps to ensure that our children have a livable future—including banning fracking on beloved public lands and cleaning up the communities that have, for too long, been forced to deal with the pollution caused by our reliance on fossil fuels. 

Unlike the current occupant of the White House, Biden has also shown that he’s capable of owning his mistakes and evolving. In the 1980s and ’90s, he helped craft the crime bills that built our system of mass incarceration. Now, he champions investing in rehabilitation, reducing prison populations, and rooting out systemic racism in police departments across the country. 

And while Biden’s work to leverage investments in clean energy was a boon to our climate, other aspects of the Obama administration’s recovery package left too many families—especially Black families—behind. Today, Biden pledges to center justice and equity in our recovery from the COVID-19 recession. He’s preparing for an “FDR-size” presidency that leads us out of our economic, racial, and environmental crises—without leaving anyone behind. For all these reasons and more, the Sierra Club is proud to endorse Joe Biden. 

With so much at stake, we need to fight like hell to get him elected, along with down-ballot candidates who can push his agenda 
forward in Congress and statehouses. And then we need to keep pushing him to make his platform promises a reality and encourage him to evolve still further.

That’s why we need you to text, call, write letters, and talk to voters as often as you can from now until Election Day. It’s the only way we’ll elect environmental champions to the White House, Senate, and state-houses—and build a world we’re proud to leave for future generations.

 This article appeared in the September/October 2020 edition with the headline "Vote Joe."

Paid for by Sierra Club Independent Action and not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.