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Young Environmental Activists Rally At Collins' Office In Support Of Green New Deal

Sunrise Movement

Young environmental activists will rally outside the Portland office of Republican U.S. Sen. Susan Collins Friday afternoon, urging her to support the Green New Deal.

Sen. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell announced earlier this month that he wants to bring a non-binding resolution supporting the package of environmental and economic legislation to a vote. The national network of young people who call themselves the "sunrise movement" have been working to convince both democratic and republican senators to vote "yes."

Bowdoin college first-year student Lucy Nolden is one of the organizers of Friday’s rally.

“The Green New Deal is pretty much the only proposal that has been introduced that has any chance of securing a livable future that our generation needs,” Nolden says. “We want to tell Senator Susan Collins that we want her to take our future seriously.”

McConnell hopes that putting the package up for a vote could force Democrats to go on record supporting the Green New Deal, which republicans and some more conservative democrats are condemning as being unrealistic.

There's no time frame yet for the potential vote.

Updated 5:13 p.m. Feb. 22, 2019

Nora is originally from the Boston area but has lived in Chicago, Michigan, New York City and at the northern tip of New York state. Nora began working in public radio at Michigan Radio in Ann Arbor and has been an on-air host, a reporter, a digital editor, a producer, and, when they let her, played records.