The First Rule About Solving Climate Change

While battleground voters overwhelmingly agree climate change is a problem, addressing it is not a priority for them. While some policies that help fight climate change are modestly popular, Americans care far more about energy affordability than they do about climate. Advocates and elected officials should understand that their messages are actively weakened by a focus on “climate” over affordability and low energy prices, and that voters are looking for immediate help with rising costs rather than solutions to abstract problems. Solutions that address affordability first, and also help fight climate change, are more likely to see strong support from voters.

A Problem, But Someone Else’s

Many climate advocates will point to data that shows Americans do care about climate change. In fact, in our own survey, 61% of battleground voters acknowledge that climate change is at least a very serious problem, and this figure rises to a whopping 87% among Democrats. A complexity of American public opinion is that Americans simultaneously believe climate change is a problem and that it is far less important than issues like affordability and healthcare.

Many things in this country are problems. Unlike high costs, which are affecting most Americans’ bottom lines right now, only 17% of voters say climate change affects themselves and their family a great deal. Among the 29% of voters who say climate change is a crisis, only 39% think it will affect them and their families a great deal. This share drops to just 14% among those who consider climate a very serious problem, rather than a crisis. And when asked to choose their top priorities from a list of issues, 6% of battleground voters said climate change was their top issue, while only 22% ranked it in their top three.

We are far from the first to point this out. Many climate advocates are reading the moment and adjusting their messaging to focus on costs. However, if the Democratic Party is going to shake the perception that they are focused on issues perceived as out-of-touch to most Americans, they’ll need a significant reset beyond just adding talk about lowering costs to climate messaging.

Americans Prioritize Other Issues Over Climate

Climate change is not a high priority for most Americans. If you look at any public poll from the past year, you’ll find that the overwhelming majority of Americans say that the cost of living is their top issue, and by a significant margin. In our survey, the top three issues that battleground voters say leaders should focus on today are affordable prices (71%), followed by healthcare (55%), and jobs and wages (50%).

However, when asked which top three issues they think the Democratic Party is focused on, battleground voters say climate change (46%), followed by LGBTQ+ issues (45%), and healthcare (45%).

This isn’t to say that Republicans are decidedly more in touch with voters’ focus on affordability—the top three issues battleground voters think Republicans are focused on are immigration (83%), crime (53%), and jobs and wages (41%). However, Republicans are perceived as somewhat closer to focusing on voters’ priorities, especially on the economy.

Notably, these results mirror findings from a January 2025 New York Times survey that found a strikingly similar split between voters’ most important issues and what they think each party is focused on.

Now, nearly eight months later, the affordability crisis is more top of mind than ever before, yet the Democratic Party is still perceived as focused on issues that rank far from voters’ top priorities—and that most don’t expect to affect them personally.

How to Talk About Climate Change: Don’t

While there is bipartisan consensus on the importance of elected officials focusing on affordability, lowering energy costs, improving public health, and diversifying America’s energy sources to meet rising demand, there is a partisan gulf that emerges as soon as you insert the words “climate change” into a sentence. Any time you see support for policies to address “climate change”, a good rule of thumb is to assume that most of the voters who are saying that are Democrats or Democratic-leaning.

In our research, Republicans and Democrats both agree that affordability should be a national priority, and they’re mostly aligned on the importance of lowering energy costs. That said, mentioning “climate change” opens up a 50-point gap in support between Republicans and Democrats not present on other issues—much larger than the gap in support for developing new energy sources (10 points) or reducing pollution (36 points). While Democrats are generally more supportive of focuses on environmental issues, climate change in particular is extra polarizing.

To make matters worse, when leaders say the words “climate change,” voters get bad vibes: A majority of battleground voters say they feel “suspicious of leaders who are pushing for certain actions to be taken or not be taken,” “bothered that climate change has become such a political issue,” or “sad about what is happening to the Earth and the environment.” Voters are more likely to feel suspicious than they are to feel motivated to help fight climate change.

So, if elected leaders shouldn’t say the words “climate change,” what should they talk about? As you can probably guess: lowering costs. It’s the only issue that over half of battleground voters say is extremely important to them—well above other climate-related issues and byproducts.

Americans Can Tell If You’re Lowering Prices

This brings us back to the point earlier about climate advocates adjusting their messaging to focus on lowering costs. From our research, simply adding “affordability” to a climate message improves it somewhat, but not enough to achieve true popularity. Voters can tell when affordability is an afterthought, and it doesn’t neutralize the toxicity of the term “climate”.

When we tested a suite of different framings for elected leaders to talk about climate change, the only one to break through—and modestly at that—was an anodyne statement about lowering costs and affordability. Everything else we tested, ranging from consumer choice to an “all of the above” approach, didn’t crack 30% in terms of strong agreement with the sentiment.

What we do know is that Americans are feeling the rising cost of energy very acutely. When Americans are asked about the top strains on their household budget, utility bills come first (63%), outpacing food costs (58%) and housing costs (50%). They also have a strong preference on what they’d like policymakers to do about these creeping costs: 50% want their home electricity and heating bills to be lower. In the same question, only 11% wanted policymakers to help them with home energy upgrades, and just 4% wanted cheaper electric vehicles.

Americans aren’t interested in substitutes or long-term schemes. They don’t want to be sold electric vehicles or appliances with claims that they will see lower utility bills. They want relief right now. They want necessities like electricity and heat to get more affordable as soon as possible, and they’ll notice if that doesn’t happen, no matter what they are promised.

Methods

This survey was run by Hart Research via an online sample of 1,454 registered voters in 7 battleground states (AZ, GA, MI, NV, NC, PA, WI), fielded over web panels from August 13, 2025 to August 18, 2025. The credibility interval is 3.1%.

The question about “top strains on your household budget” comes from an omnibus poll, coming out shortly. That poll was run by Tavern Research via an online sample of 2,423 Americans, fielded over web panels from August 1, 2025 to August 5, 2025.

Dustbin

We asked open-response questions that prompted respondents to elaborate on what favorable impressions they had of Democrats and Republicans on climate. The most common response from out-partisans (on both sides) was to give no positive impressions at all, instead elaborating on their dislike or distrust of the other party on climate.