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Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning again, everyone. Now we introduce a new regular feature, Health and Climate Tuesdays. As many of you know, for the last two years, we've done a climate story of the week on this show. The idea was that the climate doesn't change at the pace of the news cycle, right? Whether or not there was an extreme weather event or some other visible climate shock that week, we would talk about an aspect of climate change to help increase understanding of what was happening, plus the pros and cons of various approaches to it. We think, and we hope that's been useful and informative.

Now, we're going to experiment with expanding our weekly climate story to a Health and Climate Tuesdays feature. Each week we will mention several health and climate headlines and then take a deeper dive into one of them. We're adding health for a few reasons. One is to emphasize that climate isn't just about the planet in some abstract or nature preservation kind of way, not that there's anything wrong with nature preservation, but it's very much about human health.

Another is that there is so much about our health and healthcare systems that are in flux, with life expectancy declining in the US Compared to other wealthy countries as we discussed on yesterday's show, medical debt increasing compared to our global peers, Trump and RFK Jr. possibly about to introduce big, controversial health reforms that will need analysis and debate, and the revelation of how much public anger there is for our private health insurance industry. The shocking outpouring of disdain, not just sympathy, after the murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO.

Bookmark it in your brain, Health and Climate Tuesdays on The Brian Lehrer Show. Here we go in some health and climate headlines this week. The Biden administration in one of its final acts, has just announced that medical debt will now be removed from people's credit reports. The move by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau of the administration doesn't erase the debt itself, but it sends a message that considering how incomplete most people's coverage is, medical debt is often not an indicator of a person's financial irresponsibility. This should make it easier for people who've incurred medical debt to get mortgages and other loans.

Also, the US Surgeon General, Vivek Murthy, is making a big last move as well. Maybe you've heard this one. He's proposing warning labels for alcohol containers similar to what's on cigarette packs, citing alcohol's contribution to the risk of developing cancer. We've invited the surgeon general to come back on the show. He's been with us several times during his tenure. With him or someone else, we will look more closely at what kinds of drinking elevates what kinds of risk and by how much.

On the climate front, we already knew 2023 was the warmest year since they started keeping records, with the government reporting global average temperatures at more than 2 degrees Fahrenheit above 20th century averages. Now, it looks like 2024 has smashed the all time record again. Some specific location records are already being reported. This is how Axios put some of it. "Phoenix has had an average temperature for the year of 90.5 degrees Fahrenheit." That's the average temperature for all times of day on all days. 90.5. That included a record for the most days with highs that reached at or above 110, with 70 such days smashing the previous record of just 55 days.

At the other extreme, geographically in the country, even the northernmost reaches of Maine, such as Caribou and Houlton near the US-Canada border, had a record warm year. We know about storms like Hurricane Helene being so destructive and attributed largely to the ever warming ocean waters which allow hurricanes to build up more strength. That's some health and climate news for this week. Now, to our health and climate guest for today. It's New Jersey Congressman Frank Pallone, who is now the ranking Democrat on the Energy and Commerce Committee so he's going to play a big role.

Energy and commerce is where all the health and climate and energy legislation has to be approved before going to the House floor. We recorded this interview yesterday to accommodate Congressman Pallone's schedule. I asked him about Trump's stated desire to undo the clean energy incentives and other climate related provisions of the Inflation Reduction Act. Since that was an act of Congress, I asked, "What are you anticipating that you might be asked to do on your committee?"

Congressman Frank Pallone: Well, the best thing that happened today, as I think you know, is that President Biden basically issued an executive order prohibiting any oil and gas drilling off the coast, both the Atlantic coast, the Pacific coast, as well as some parts of the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska where there hasn't been any drilling yet. Obviously, Trump would not like that. We, and myself personally, have been fighting this battle for years.

By way of background though, from an energy production perspective, we're drilling for more oil and gas and producing more oil and gas in the United States than we ever have. In fact, I think for the last six years, we've exceeded the level of oil and gas production of any other country, and it's the largest production of oil and gas in American history. Part of my saying that we don't need to drill offshore is because we produce so much, and the offshore drilling has the real potential of a spill, which would be terrible for our economy.

I think like anything else, I'm not saying we shouldn't have oil and gas production. I just think it has to be done in a smart way and we have to move towards renewables because we need to protect the environment and reduce the amount of greenhouse gases.

Brian Lehrer: Right. Well, let me ask you a couple of pushback questions on what President Biden did there. Why should he be able to do such a major thing by executive order without going back through Congress, through your committee, and then the whole Congress for specific authorization? This is, in a way, the opposite of what a lot of people who are climate-concerned fear Trump is going to do just with the stroke of a pen.

Congressman Frank Pallone: Well, because we passed a bill called the Outer Continental Shelf Act or something like that years ago, and Congress authorized the president to have this power. It's not like something he's making up. It is legislated. The only way that that could change would be if we pass legislation either repealing that act or overturning what Biden did, say legislatively. It can't be done because President Trump comes in and issues another executive order. The courts have pretty much settled that, in my opinion. It is pursuant to congressional action, even though it's an executive order.

Brian Lehrer: Well, then should President Trump, when he takes office, if he wants to legally be able to similarly undo this exact order with a stroke of his pen?

Congressman Frank Pallone: I don't believe he would have the authority to do that because he tried to do it before in another way and there was a court decision that said that he doesn't have that power. I think that would be upheld again. Beyond that, there's a political aspect of it, Brian, which is that, remember again, this is pretty much a bipartisan initiative. In other words, the governors of every coastal state, be it Pacific or Atlantic, most of the congressmen that represent coastal areas, many of whom are Republican, do not want offshore oil and drilling and so I think it would be very hard politically to get Congress to repeal what Biden did today.

Brian Lehrer: Is that even the representatives from Texas and Louisiana with their offshore drilling operations?

Congressman Frank Pallone: No, not necessarily. Remember, I'm talking about areas where there is no drilling now. He did not prohibit drilling in any areas where it's already occurring or the lease sales have already been out there. There are areas in the Gulf that are included in the band, but those are areas where there is no drilling right now. Places like Florida, the Carolinas, Georgia, in most of those cases, the governors and the legislators and the congressmen from those areas would want to see a ban on drilling.

That's why I think-- Remember, you're talking about a majority in the House. There's only what, 2 or 3 at this point, and there's probably at least, 20 or so Republicans, maybe more from those coastal areas that would not want this reversed.

Brian Lehrer: My guest is New Jersey Congressman Frank Pallone. He is now the ranking Democrat on the Energy and Commerce Committee, which deals with so many things, including most appropriately for this Health and Climate Tuesday section of the show, the broad topics of climate and energy and health as well as other things. The new chairman of the committee is Republican Congressman Brett Guthrie of Kentucky. How much do you think he's someone you can do business with as a reasonable conservative as opposed to more radically MAGA or however you would put that on health and climate issues?

Congressman Frank Pallone: Brett is definitely in the tradition of the other Republican chairs of the committee that I've served under, certainly since I've been the ranking member. He is somebody that we can definitely work with. He is conservative but there are many areas where we'll have common ground. To be honest, I don't know how much you want to get into it, but if you remember at the end of the last session when we were doing the continuing resolution, we had actually come to an agreement on a number of bills that came out of our committee that were included in that end of the year package.

That was the one that Elon Musk and Trump ultimately sabotaged. Those were all initiatives that were bipartisan that were worked out in our committee mostly unanimously. That serves an example, if you will, of how our committee often works on a bipartisan basis.

Brian Lehrer: Well, when Trump says he wants to end clean energy and other climate related provisions of the Inflation Reduction Act, since that was an act of Congress, what are you anticipating you might be asked to do?

Congressman Frank Pallone: Well, that's where we're going to have a major problem because he and most of the Republicans and all the Republican leadership in the House, tend to not believe in climate action, don't support and didn't vote for the provisions in the Inflation Reduction Act that encourage renewables and prioritize renewables. The tax credits for wind and solar power, for electric vehicles, the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund or the methane reduction provisions that came from our committee, those things are unfortunately partisan.

I do see an effort on the part of the Republican leadership, including the committee leadership, in trying to eliminate those provisions that prioritize renewables and seek to address the climate problem and the reduction in greenhouse gases. That's where we're going to have to fight a battle, a huge battle, in my opinion, between the parties.

Brian Lehrer: How do you see Chairman Guthrie in this respect? How much of a climate effects denier, like apparently the energy secretary nominee, Chris Wright seems to be. He's a fracking executive who's spoken very explicitly in some soundbites that I've heard that he doesn't believe there's a climate crisis. He doesn't believe extreme weather events are being caused by the warm and climate. He doesn't believe that there is a transition. I've heard him say that. Is Chairman Guthrie like that, as far as you could tell, versus someone who considers climate a problem to be dealt with, at very least?

Congressman Frank Pallone: I think that almost every Republican in the House and on our committee, although they may admit that the planet is warming, will deny that it's human-induced or that human behavior is a major contributing factor. At least they'll say that publicly so this is going to be a battle. Can we pick off some Republicans either in the committee or on the floor so that we win those battles? Yes, maybe we're certainly going to try, but most of them will say that although there's a warming of the planet, they don't believe that it's human-induced. That is going to be the biggest challenge for me and for Democrats when it comes to climate issues.

Brian Lehrer: I guess I'll have to ask one of them to respond to the curve of carbon emissions from industry over a century and a half and how it matches the curve of warming temperatures and ask what their alternative hypothesis is. Trump did run very centrally on making energy more affordable through more aggressive drilling. I think if Americans who voted for him were voting for anything, it was probably that and mass deportation.

Are the results humbling for you at all in terms of how quickly the public wants to transition to renewables versus the temporary costs involved in making fossil fuels more scarce than Trump wants them to be even if the public generally accepts that human made climate change is real?

Congressman Frank Pallone: Well, the problem, Brian, in my opinion is really communications and I'm not saying on your part, I'm saying on my part and on the Democrats part. The bottom line is that renewables ultimately do create more jobs and bring the cost of energy down. There's this notion that somehow you're going to drill yourself-- More drilling is going to mean lower prices at the pump. It's really not true.

Just to give you an example, a big part of the Republican initiative in our committee has been to export more liquefied natural gas. Right? Well, the bottom line is that if we produce more gas and liquify it and ship it overseas, that actually brings the price of gas home higher. This notion that somehow pumping more, whether it's gas or its oil is going to bring the price down, is not accurate. It's hard-- Again, making that case is difficult because a lot of people just say, "Oh well, I guess if you pump more then the price will go down."

Well, it depends what you do with it. If you export it to other countries, the price may very well go up. We have facts that show that export of liquefied natural gas does increase the price here at home. I think part of this is just a communications problem. I'm not asking you to play that role, but I have to.

Brian Lehrer: Well, but then would your America First Republican colleagues say let's stop the exports so that we keep drilling here and have more and more supply which will reduce the price theoretically?

Congressman Frank Pallone: They don't do that, Brian. They're very much with the corporate interests. If the oil companies or the gas companies say, "We want to drill more and export it," they're all for it because they'll say oh, what is it, capitalist world economy, they can sell it to whoever they want. Sometimes I get if you make it a national security issue, then in certain circumstances, they may not be willing to have more exports but generally speaking they just do what the oil and the gas companies want.

Brian Lehrer: You're accusing them of being anti-globalist in name only or except when it's in the interest of their company's profits or the companies of who these Republican congressmen represent.

Congressman Frank Pallone: Right. Either they're doing the bidding of the oil companies because they're their friends and they're helping them with their campaigns, or they just are so steadfast in this capitalist notion that you should be able to sell it wherever you want. There shouldn't be any restrictions on it. That's generally what I have to deal with with them.

Brian Lehrer: My guest is New Jersey Congressman Frank Pallone, who is the ranking Democrat on the Energy and Commerce Committee, which, besides dealing with climate and energy, which we've been talking about, also deals with health. Of course, health insurance costs have been in the news again because of the public outcry over rising premiums and co-pays and delays and denials after the assassination of United Healthcare CEO, Brian Thompson.

The murder was a horrible crime, I'm sure you agree with that, but there was also this other public thing that got revealed. Do you or does the committee have any plans to improve the health insurance system to prevent the kinds of delays and denials and costs that have people so angry and having their health and even life and death affected in ways that we know it does?

Congressman Frank Pallone: Well, absolutely. Look, the biggest, if I could get across, in terms of my view, and I also think of Democratic policy in general, is that we recognize that we have to bring costs down. That rising health care costs, rising energy costs, all these things, I think people, obviously don't like it and would like us to do something to make things more affordable. Healthcare costs have been rising so fast, and insurers, in an effort to try to make their costs less or to increase their profits, are starting to exclude things, exclude certain procedures, exclude whatever they can in order to make a buck and bring their costs down. It's just very detrimental to the average person.

One of the things that drives a lot of my constituents crazy is this move towards prior authorization. Every thing increasingly has to be prior authorized before you can proceed. Then if it's not, you don't get the care. That has to be addressed. The other major thing we've been doing is price transparency. This was something that actually came out of the committee, again on a bipartisan basis, passed the House, but not the Senate, and some parts of it were included in the end of the year package, which is empowering people.

If you know what prices are, then you can either comparison shop or, at least your insurer and your employer can comparison shop. We have a bill that reveals prices for hospital care, pricing for pharmacy benefit managers, which is a huge cost for prescription drugs. That's another thing that's a priority also that is bipartisan. Then I would like to expand the negotiated prices for drugs that we had that we now have, was my bill under Medicare for seniors to expand it to everyone.

When we had the House rules package on swearing in day last Friday, I actually tried to move that as part of the rules package or move in that direction, and it was defeated because the Republicans, one of the things that they may try to do in their reconciliation is to repeal the negotiated prices I'd like for under Medicare for drugs. I'd like to expand it to everyone instead. These are a lot of those affordability issues that may come up and that we're going to have to fight for.

Brian Lehrer: Do you see any appetite on the part of the committee's Republican majority to do anything that you would consider constructive on health insurance reform? There's certainly bipartisan outcry in the general public about this.

Congressman Frank Pallone: Well, I think, again, it becomes ideological. In other words, they don't like the government interfering with the prices that drug companies can sell their products so they tend to be against the government negotiating prices for prescription drugs because the laissez faire thing, let them charge what they want. On the other hand, if you talk about price transparency, they see that more as maybe a capitalist thing. In other words, that if we know what the prices are, then there can be more competition and people can shop around.

You have to look at it from-- If you want to get something done, you have to put your mindset into how some of the Republicans think and see if you can come up with something that can be bipartisan that still moves the needle towards making things more affordable?

Brian Lehrer: Well, one thing we know about RFK Jr. is that he's a big skeptic when it comes to the virtue of the pharmaceutical companies. Do you think your committee might have to deal with anything either good or bad, coming from RFK Jr. if he's confirmed as Health and Human Services Secretary in this respect?

Congressman Frank Pallone: Well, I just am concerned because he seems to have very extreme views on a lot of different things that, in my opinion, are not very rational. There's certain things that he says that I agree with. In other words, he does seem to want to rein in Big Pharma. He does seem to be in favor of labeling. For example, food safety comes under us too. Everything with the FDA comes under our committee too, with the Food and Drug Administration.

I can agree with those things but on the other hand, then he's anti-vaxxer and doesn't want to support vaccinations in most cases and takes an extreme position on that. I do worry that he-- I don't want to say he's totally irrational, but I do think a lot of the things that come out from his mouth tend to be not scientifically-oriented and too much into this conspiracy theory that a lot of the Trump people have. I do worry that he's overall harmful to health and safety issues.

Brian Lehrer: I guess if he is confirmed, we'll have to see what winds up in actual legislation before Congress. We're almost out of time with New Jersey Congressman Frank Pallone in the context of him being the ranking Democrat on the Energy and Commerce Committee now. Last topic outside the realms of health and climate, I see a press release from the Energy and Commerce Committee touting bipartisan draft legislation for social media companies that would allow free speech while incentivizing good stewardship of social media platforms. Is that about standards for when they should strike disinformation or dangerous information?

Congressman Frank Pallone: Yes. Again, gets into the weeds here. Section 230 of the Communications Act basically, really has been expanded so much that right now, a lot of these companies just feel that they're totally shielded from any liability and can do whatever they want. That worries me. I have been an advocate for saying that section 230 needs to be reformed because--

Brian Lehrer: Can I jump in on section 230 just so we bring our listeners along? Is it that it allows the platforms to not be legally responsible for the content that users post there? Is that a good way to put it?

Congressman Frank Pallone: Exactly. That's the problem. I don't think that it was meant to be interpreted that way. Again, this is a bipartisan initiative. It was not just me, but it was also the chairman who recently left, Cathy Rogers, who Brett Guthrie now is replacing. Look, we need to do a lot. First of all, the whole privacy issue of big tech. In other words, we have this national data privacy bill that both Democrats and Republicans on my committee have been trying to push for years.

The hallmark of that is data minimization, that we don't want these tech companies to just basically capture all your data, sell it without your knowledge. That's another major initiative that, hopefully, we can work on on a bipartisan basis. The only real answer to it is to really minimize the amount of data that they can collect, which is what our bill does. Again, it's bipartisan.

We did a little of that, Brian. The data brokers are a big problem too. We had a bill that was signed into law that says that data brokers can't sell to our enemies like Beijing and Putin and others. It came up the same time as the TikTok bill but this whole idea of being able to sell your data without your knowledge is really outrageous.

Brian Lehrer: Well, that's the privacy aspect. We know Republicans were concerned when Trump, let's say, was removed from X and removed from, I think Facebook as well because of what they deemed to be dangerous disinformation that he was putting out there around the so called Stop The Steal. I guess the question as it pertains to section 230 is this is different from a radio station, let's say, where I'm responsible for the things I say because I say them. Some random person posting on X or Bluesky or TikTok with a billion other users out there, should the platform be responsible for any harms that come from that?

Congressman Frank Pallone: Well, I do think they have a responsibility. Now, some of the Republicans would say that it's different. It's not the same as broadcast TV or radio but the bottom line is that they have a certain responsibility too. They just can't let anybody say anything because if they do, it's harmful. I would argue that there should be some liability and that's the problem with section 230. It's been so broadly interpreted now that they feel they have no liability.

Brian Lehrer: I know you wanted to say something before you go about AM radio. What was that?

Congressman Frank Pallone: Oh, yes. Well, I was thinking about it today because of the storm here in Washington. We had 6 inches of snow, more is expected. After Hurricane Sandy, some of the automakers began to say that AM radio, rather than be a standard feature on cars and trucks, was no longer going to be, and that you'd have to pay for it extra or it wouldn't even be available.

I think it's very dangerous because people use AM radio in emergency, whatever it is, a storm, a hurricane, whatever. I had a bill that I think came very close. It passed the House and came very close to passing the Senate at the end of the year, but just didn't make it and we're trying to revive that. That's very much a bipartisan bill as well.

Brian Lehrer: Congressman Frank Pallone from New Jersey, lot of the Jersey Shore, Perth Amboy, down to Asbury park, more or less, and now the ranking Democrat on the Energy and Commerce Committee. Thank you so much for joining us. Good luck. We hope to speak to you and some of your Democratic and Republican colleagues because health and climate and energy are among the things we cover a lot on this show. We hope to keep talking. Thank you very, very much.

Congressman Frank Pallone: Thank you, Brian. Thanks a lot. Take care.

Brian Lehrer: Again, listeners, that interview with Congressman Pallone was recorded yesterday to accommodate his schedule that's why we couldn't take phone calls.

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