East Central Reporter

Illinois State Rep. Chris Miller (R-101) criticized the so-called "Climate and Equitable Jobs Act" (CEJA) and the "climate crisis" in general during a speech on the floor of the Illinois House.

“For the last 69 years we’ve had a ‘climate crisis and we’ve gone from one thing to the other," Miller said. "When I was a kid we had global cooling and we were going to have the great freeze, and four billion people were going to die; and then we went to global warming, where the Earth was going to turn into a frying pan.”

"One of the common threads that links all of these ideas together is none of it ever happened and, guess what, none of it is ever going to happen,” he said. “We aren't going to be destroyed by CO2 and I would suggest that probably most the people in this body don't even know what carbon dioxide is; here's a good dose of it.”

He then exhaled into his microphone and said, “here's a little carbon dioxide for you and guess what nobody's gonna die.”

CEJA was passed by the Illinois General Assembly in 2021 and signed into law by Gov. JB Pritzker (D-Ill.), according to the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The Illinois EPA said the law's purpose is to "phase out carbon emissions from the energy and transportation sectors" and directs the state's EPA to create incentives for electric vehicles (EVs) and charging stations.

Miller's comments came as the House was debating HB 3445, which gives "energy company Ameren Illinois the right of first refusal to build transmission lines in downstate service areas," Miller wrote in his June 5 newsletter. Miller said of HB 3445 that "some claim that this is just Democrat back-peddling to try and fix the potentially disastrous Climate and Equitable Jobs Act." 

HB 3445 passed in the Illinois Senate 41-9 with one 'present' vote, and in the Illinois House 63-32, with two 'present' votes.

Gov. Pritzker has said he will veto the bill, reported Capitol News Illinois.