The 2024 presidential election marketing campaign has already begun. Barring a serious change within the well being standing of the 2 aged front-runners, or the authorized circumstances of former President Donald Trump, there is no such thing as a thriller about who shall be main their respective Democratic and Republican tickets. All the Home of Representatives can also be up for grabs, as is one-third of the U.S. Senate.

Many difficult points will confront the voters: reproductive freedom; immigration; inflation and the state of the economic system; the Israel/Hamas and Ukraine/Russia conflicts; local weather change; and lots of others on the state and native ranges.  

Most sustainability points aren’t a central focus of this yr’s marketing campaign regardless of ongoing controversies regarding environmental, social and governance (ESG) points, publicity to microplastics and litigation over the federal authorities’s diploma of authorized authority to implement environmental statutes. How, then, to current sustainability to the voters?

Election selections

Each main events and their candidates will be anticipated to roll out a variety of positions to influence particular blocs of voters to endorse their slate of candidates.

Democrats will cite a litany of accomplishments together with a robust and persevering with bounce again from the pandemic with a sturdy jobs market and declining inflation. They’ll have fun main legislative accomplishments such because the Infrastructure Funding and Jobs Act (2021), the Inflation Discount Act (2022) and the CHIPS and Science Act (2022), which, collectively, present tons of of billions of {dollars} in grants, tax credit and different financing for modern clear vitality applied sciences, semiconductors and public infrastructure. Democrats may even painting their actions to manage greenhouse gases and different pollution as advancing environmental fairness for at-risk populations. The advantages of many of those initiatives have but to have an effect on voters, however they are going to be offered as investments for a greater future.

Republicans will give attention to the associated fee and financial disruptions of the Democrats’ financial and environmental plans. They’ll cite their fealty to market forces to optimize financial decision-making reasonably than government-determined industrial insurance policies. On the identical time, Republicans and their enterprise neighborhood allies will proceed to advocate authorities investments for carbon sequestration and growth of hydrogen-based fuels. They may even painting ESG as European socialism and oppose further ESG reporting as a burden upon enterprise. Republicans enthusiastically help court docket challenges to the federal authorities’s regulatory authorities.

What not to do that election season

Election seasons are additionally characterised by gaffes that political opponents stand prepared to use. Given the historical past of the 2 presumptive presidential nominees, that is more likely to be a gaffe-filled marketing campaign. Gaffes usually replicate a strategic mindset that campaigns have concerning the voters and its priorities and values. Some errors to keep away from this marketing campaign season embrace:

• Inauthenticity. Voters are innately suspicious about politicians and infrequently see by the distinction between their marketing campaign statements and the way they really voted. Republicans who present up at ribbon-cutting ceremonies to dedicate new infrastructure initiatives that they voted towards is a unbroken story. Equally, Democrats who voted for clear vitality laws face criticism for his or her advocacy of native pipeline or fossil gas vitality initiatives.
• Speaking about processes reasonably than outcomes. Voters usually don’t have a lot curiosity or information in how politicians or professionals train their craft — attempt explaining danger evaluation or materiality evaluations to your loved ones — and can tune out if that’s the main target of your communication. Somewhat, it’s essential to current the direct, private advantages of marketing campaign proposals and the values they symbolize.
• Eradicating widespread merchandise from {the marketplace}. The Biden administration dodged two politically delicate bullets this yr by permitting gasoline stoves to stay in the marketplace (albeit with stricter vitality effectivity requirements in future years) and saying plans to increase the 2032 deadline for emissions limits on inside combustion engines. Public opinion is extraordinarily cautious about limits or bans on widespread merchandise within the quick run and may shortly be mobilized into populist responses to protect their freedom of selection within the market.
• Utilizing unclear language. A long time in the past, conservative pollster Frank Luntz suggested his enterprise shoppers that “local weather change” could be a greater descriptor to help their pursuits than “world warming.” This terminology has subsequently develop into a part of the accepted lexicon throughout the local weather debate. Within the 2024 marketing campaign, technical, programmatic or elite-sounding phrases reminiscent of “sustainability, “web zero,” “ESG” or “transparency” ought to give technique to language reminiscent of “environmental progress,” “local weather objectives,” “equity and fairness” and “openness,” respectively. This substitution avoids the political lure that candidates are speaking all the way down to voters or don’t relate to their wants.

Assumptions concerning the voters — and instructed messaging

Voter participation charges over a number of election cycles in 2020 and 2022 powerfully sign that the general public is motivated to vote on many problems with deep private concern to them. These embrace ladies’s fears over the rising lack of their reproductive freedoms, youthful voters’ passionate beliefs about local weather change and minority residents’ priorities of societal fairness and justice. Whereas not all of voters’ priorities will instantly bear on sustainability points, a rising tide of voter engagement can present environmental, public well being and social points with larger political momentum after the election.

With these components in thoughts, sustainability advocates ought to give attention to a number of easy, but highly effective messages throughout this season’s election campaigns:

• “Vote!” Voting is an important message — and motion — that helps the sustainability agenda this yr. Registering new voters and turning them and present voters out will strengthen essential political relationships up and down the poll and pave the best way for future “asks” from elected officers.
• “Shield important freedoms.” These freedoms vary from the preservation of fresh air and water in native communities to defending a lady’s proper to make choices involving her personal physique. This general message will be subdivided for particular voting blocs (youth, ladies) whereas serving as an umbrella that summarizes core values.
• “Save the longer term.” This message embodies financial funding, innovation and safety traits essential to enterprise and employees, but it surely additionally helps insurance policies to guard towards disruptive mega-risks reminiscent of local weather change and identifies alternatives for future generations.
• “Work collectively.” As a complete, the American public is persistently receptive to efforts that submerge partisan bickering in favor of collaborative efforts that bridge political and coverage variations that yield progress in direction of fixing issues that have an effect on their lives.

Communication on extra particular sustainability points — biodiversity, ESG, modernizing the electrical energy grid, regulatory coverage — shall be essential in interesting to the blocs of voters extra instantly engaged in them. The power to place these and different sustainability initiatives as proof factors inside broader messaging methods pays dividends with impartial voters and additional encourage these already searching for to have their voices heard.