Varshini Prakash - Winning the Green New Deal: Why We Must, How We Can

Simon & Schuster

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Compilation copyright 2020 by Sunrise Movement

The Adults in the Room, People Power and Political Power,

Organize. Vote. Strike. 2020 by Varshini Prakash

The Crisis Here and Now 2020 by David Wallace-Wells

Paradisemay it be all its name implies 2020 by Mikala Butson

We Didnt Start the Fire 2020 by Kate Aronoff

Market Fundamentalism at the Worst Time 2020 by Naomi Klein

Averting Climate Collapse Requires Confronting Racism 2020 by Ian Haney Lpez

How We Got to the Green New Deal 2020 by Bill McKibben

Policies and Principles of a Green New Deal 2020 by Rhiana Gunn-Wright

The Economic Case for a Green New Deal 2020 by Joseph Stiglitz

A Green New Deal for the Gulf South 2020 by Colette Pichon Battle

Money smelled like mountains of oyster shells rotting in the sun 2020 by Genai Lewis

Green New Bingo Hall 2020 by Julian Brave NoiseCat

A Workers Green New Deal 2020 by Mary Kay Henry

Together, we part the sea 2020 by Jeremy Ornstein

We Shine Bright: Organizing in Hope and Song 2020 by Sara Blazevic, Victoria Fernandez, Dyanna Jaye, and Aru Shiney-Ajay

Blue skies in America 2020 by Saya Ameli Hajebi

A Third Reconstruction for Our Common Home 2020 by Rev. William J. Barber II

The Next Era of American Politics 2020 by Guido Girgenti and Waleed Shahid

From Protest to Primaries: The Movement in the Democratic Party 2020 by Alexandra Rojas and Waleed Shahid

Reviving Labor, in New Deals Old and Green 2020 by Bob Master

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First Simon & Schuster trade paperback edition August 2020

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Prakash, Varshini, editor. | Girgenti, Guido, editor. Title: Winning the green new deal : why we must, how we can / edited by Varshini Prakash & Guido Girgenti of the Sunrise Movement. Description: First Simon & Schuster trade paperback edition. | New York : Simon & Schuster, 2020. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2020023589 (print) | LCCN 2020023590 (ebook) | ISBN 9781982142438 | ISBN 9781982142476 (paperback) | ISBN 9781982142483 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: EnvironmentalismPolitical aspectsUnited States. | Green movementUnited States. | Environmental policyUnited States. | United StatesEnvironmental conditions. Classification: LCC GE197 .W57 2020 (print) | LCC GE197 (ebook) | DDC 363.7/060973dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020023589 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020023590

ISBN 978-1-9821-4243-8

ISBN 978-1-9821-4248-3 (ebook)

VARSHINI PRAKASH

I dont know how to say this except to just say it: Young people have got to rise up. Thats it. Thats the message. If you take one thing away from this book, let it be the courage to rise up alongside your friends and classmates and neighbors to demand a safe future for all of us, and the certainty that if we rise together, we will win.

I had that rise up feeling when I awoke early on September 20, 2019.

While Id been asleep in the US, millions of young people around the world had been pouring out onto the streets of cities and towns small and large in unprecedented numbers. I scrolled through Twitter from my bed, awestruck at images of schoolchildren in Delhi chanting in unison, thousands in Japan, hundreds of thousands pouring out across Australia. Over 1.4 million people were already striking in Germany. In every country, thousands of youths gathered with homemade signs, images of the earth and words scrawled onto pieces of paper. My personal favorite: If you wont be the adults, then we will.

I swung out of bed, ready to join tens of thousands more in New York City, where leaders like the indomitable sixteen-year-old Greta Thunberg would be rallying. I made my way to Foley Square, the sidewalks streaming with teenagers hours before the march was set to begin.

Groups of schoolchildren covered the green, some who couldnt have been older than five or six standing alongside teachers and parents holding banners. Thousands of teenagers were excused from class by New York Citys Department of Education so they could strike. I caught up with activists like fourteen-year-old Alexandria Villaseor and sixteen-year-old Jamie Margolin. The average age of the protesters was a full three decades lower than at any other mass demonstration Id attended. The energy was palpable, buoyant, and fierce, heightened by the rising heat of the day.

I made my way to the stage, pushing through throngs of young people of all races, from every borough in the city, arriving backstage just as the first speakers bellowed into the microphone.

I looked out at the vast numbers reaching as far back as the eye could see. Ill tell you, there is nothing more beautiful than thousands of people standing as one, in active hope for a better future.

And yet, as I peered out, tears began flooding down my face, and I felt a tightness in my stomach. These were children. And they were compelled, instead of playing with their peers or studying or hanging out on a Friday afternoon and enjoying the last few moments of summer, to march, to fight, to demand, to plead for their futures. They knew irrevocable damage may be done long before they reach voting age or can run for office. They would be left in stewardship of a treacherous world, while older generations, dead and gone, would never face the consequences of their ruinous actions.

We are defined not by the conditions in which we find ourselves but in how we choose to respond. In this moment it was apparent that, against all odds, young people were choosing to fight back, young people were choosing hope, young people were choosing life. We are not the first generation to witness environmental disaster, but we are the last with the power to stop its cataclysmic force. We havent caused this problemnor do we know how our future will unfold. And yet we are choosing responsibility and action, choosing each other, over isolation, fear, and retreat. Its a scary thing, but its all the more possible when we do it together.

All this rushed through my head when suddenly my name was called. I stepped up, the sun beating down, to a cheering crowd of 250,000 people. My strength came back, soaring into my lungs. and I jumped up onto the stage.

When I first learned about the climate crisis as a kid, I would lie awake late into the night, heart pounding, imagining what it would mean for me and people who looked like me around the world. I couldnt get the images out of my head: of what people would do to each other when they were faced with no food or water, with cages and guns, when they sought sanctuary in other countries. I felt alone, small, powerless.