Boehner: Dems’ climate proposals would kill jobs

House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) challenged Democrats on Thursday to propose policies to fight climate change that do not kill jobs, saying that they would come up with such proposals if they were serious about the issue.

Boehner was asked in a press conference to respond to the Obama administration’s climate assessment released Tuesday, which concluded that climate change is having affects all over the United States, and it is contributed to floods, wildfires and droughts.

{mosads}He said he wouldn’t comment on the assessment itself, saying that he did not want to “get into a debate over the science.”

But he did comment on Democratic solutions to climate change.

“It just strikes me that every proposal that Democrats have to deal with the issue of climate change would kill jobs in America,” Boehner said.

“The American people are still asking the question, ‘Where are the jobs?’ And if they’re still serious about dealing with this issue, why can’t they begin to look at this in a way that won’t kill jobs in our country,” he asked.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) responded to the report Tuesday, predicting that President Obama would use the report to push for a national energy tax.

“The president’s own party couldn’t even pass a national energy tax when it had complete control of Washington,” McConnell said. “The American people weren’t willing to go along with considerable domestic pain for negligible global gain then. It’s foolish to think they’d assent to a bad idea now.”