South Carolina senator stumps for climate change

The South Carolina Republican has joined forces with Democrat John Kerry of Massachusetts and independent Joe Lieberman of Connecticut to drum up support for a bill that would put a price on heat-trapping pollution.

Graham's position has irked just about everybody. He has been censured by Republicans back home for supporting a bill that would clamp down on greenhouse gases. Environmentalists have criticized his push for nuclear energy, more oil drilling — and most recently his support of a GOP effort to prevent the Environmental Protection Agency from regulating greenhouse gases. Some Democrats are just befuddled.

But his ability to attract enough votes for a bill to pass the Senate may well determine whether President Barack Obama can deliver on the promises he makes at U.N. climate talks in Copenhagen this week, and whether he will achieve one of his top domestic priorities: setting up a cap-and-trade system that would put a price on each ton of global warming pollution released.

Graham sat down with The Associated Press for a half-hour interview Thursday to discuss his stance on climate change.

Q: How did you get involved in this issue?

A: It was a slow evolution. I started traveling with Sen. (John) McCain, who has been a climate change advocate for a long time, and I went to the Arctic region with him and Sen. (Hillary Rodham) Clinton. I came to the conclusion from listening to the scientists ... from people who lived in the regions, that the canary in the coal mine is in the Arctic regions, and that the planet is heating up. How much is caused by greenhouse gases, I don't know. But I believe to some extent it's a contributing factor. ...

Now, why did I choose to do something this time around? ... The one thing that I could say without any doubt, that the best chance to create jobs for the future here in this country is energy independence. And you will never become energy independent until you price carbon.

Where are the friction points to getting to 60 votes (to advance a bill)? If the emissions standard is not meaningful, if it's not economy-wide, I don't think you get there. This whole issue of China and India and a global regime looms large in getting 60 votes in the Senate. Without some assurances that this is not a unilateral surrendering of market share to China and India — because our companies will have a burden imposed upon them not shared by China and India — is a huge political problem. ... Those are some of the trip wires that exist to getting to 60 votes.

Q: Why haven't you been able to convince other Republicans to buy your argument?