S. Florida GOP Lead First Bipartisan Effort to Stop Climate Change

Republican lawmakers in South Florida whose districts are plagued by rising sea levels are leading a bipartisan congressional effort to stop climate change, The Miami Herald reports.

The newspaper says GOP Reps. Carlos Curbelo and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Democratic Rep. Ted Deutch have created a so-called "buddy system."

Each Democratic member must bring along a GOP colleague "willing to renounce party orthodoxy and stop minimizing the peril — or even existence — of global warming," according to The Herald.

"For too long in Washington, we've been unable to have a bipartisan discussion around climate change," Deutch said at recently at a sea-level summit in Fort Lauderdale.

"But in South Florida, where the rate of sea-level rise outpaces the global rate tenfold, and where the high water mark jumps one inch each year … we must act for the benefit of our environment and for the benefit of our economy."

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