ABOUT ELISSA SLOTKIN:
Elissa has dedicated her career to serving the country she loves. A former CIA analyst who served three tours in Iraq alongside the U.S. military, Elissa then worked in national security roles at the Pentagon and White House under President Bush and President Obama. In the Obama Administration, she briefed the President on some of the most sensitive national security matters of the day and was eventually nominated to serve as Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs at the Pentagon.
In 2018, Elissa was motivated to do more and ran for Congress, flipping a long time Republican-held seat and helping Democrats retake the majority in the U.S. House of Representatives. Elissa was re-elected to the House in 2020 and again in 2022 by delivering on the things that mattered the most to her constituents – expanding access to affordable healthcare, lowering the cost of prescription drugs, and bringing critical supply chains and manufacturing back to Michigan.
In November 2024, Elissa was elected to serve Michigan in the U.S. Senate, succeeding Debbie Stabenow. In the Senate, Elissa will fight to expand Michigan’s middle class, create jobs with dignity, and keep our communities and children safe.
ABOUT LISA WOZNIAK:
Lisa’s career spans over two decades of environmental and conservation advocacy in the political arena. She is a nationally- recognized expert in non-profit growth and management and a leader in Great Lakes protections. Lisa is a three-time graduate from the University of Michigan, with a bachelor's degree and two ensuing master's degrees in social work and Education.
Lisa serves a co-host and content partner in 89.1 WEMU's '1st Friday Focus on the Environment.'
RESOURCES:
Michigan League of Conservation Voters
TRANSCRIPTION:
David Fair: This is 89.1 WEMU, and this is the first Friday in the month of February. And with that in mind, welcome to WEMU's First Friday Focus on the Environment. I'm David Fair, and on each first Friday, we explore important environmental issues with special guests, and my partner and co-host is Lisa Wozniak. Lisa serves as CEO and President of the Michigan League of Conservation Voters. And, Lisa, fair to say it's been a fascinating and perhaps challenging start to the new year.
Lisa Wozniak: Indeed it has, David! And our guest today has certainly had a challenging and interesting few months. Elissa Slotkin is one of the Democratic U.S. Senators from Michigan and has come under fire recently from President Trump in a rather startling and alarming fashion, and, all the while, she has continued to work on issues that protect the health and the safety of our natural environment, among other things. Senator Slotkin, thank you so much for taking out time out of very busy schedule to join us on WEMU!
David Fair: We appreciate it!
Sen. Elissa Slotkin: Happy to be here! Thank you!
David Fair: Well, the first component of the environment we need to discuss is that political environment in Washington. It's been polarized for quite some time now, but in this second term of this administration, the tone and tenor have become darker and perhaps more troubling to many. What characteristics and actions of this administration are you most concerned about?
Sen. Elissa Slotkin: Well, I think, look. I mean, we're coming, we just passed this sort of one-year anniversary of president Trump being in office. And so, that always prompts some reflection. I think we have a combination of things. Certainly, everything he ran on and everything he said he was going to do on affordability, on housing, on the price of groceries, on the price of utilities, we haven't seen frankly almost any action on any of those things. What we've seen instead is a real ramping up of kind of going after those fundamental democratic freedom that i think all Americans, regardless of party, really care about. And I think nowhere has that been more apparent than what's going on in Minneapolis. And I think, even in a state like Michigan, which is very politically diverse, just a number of people who have come up to me in the past month, the first month of 2026, to say how startled they are about the sort of right to protest, the right to free speech, the right not to have someone come into your home without a real warrant from a judge. Those are the kinds of things I hear about quite a bit and have characterized 2026 in this short time.
Lisa Wozniak: Do you think there's any hope--any hope at all--for bipartisan action to put in place some guardrails to deter the administration from this continued retribution, threats, and misuse of their powers?
Sen. Elissa Slotkin: Well, look. I do think a number of my Republican peers here in the House and Senate have been more vocal than we've seen them be in the past year. And I think the proof is in the pudding. We passed a bunch of budgets last week: full year appropriations, which is what the Legislature does. And the Republicans were basically told by President Trump to allow our plan, our Democratic plan, to separate out the Department of Homeland Security budget from the other budgets because he knew that the response from the grassroots in America was not good. And that's not just on Democratic sides. I mean, when you lose Joe Rogan on what you're doing, it's a, I think, a sign on both sides of the aisle. So, we've seen some of my colleagues be a little bit more willing to show some leg and say some things that are more critical. You know, I think we measure success here in millimeters, not in feet, but you can kind of spin a lot of things. But when you see a video of an American citizen being killed in the streets for protesting, your eyes don't lie. And I think a lot of Americans were deeply, deeply struck by those videos.
David Fair: Now, we saw environmental program cuts and policy rollbacks with the first Trump administration, and it's only accelerated in the second term. There've been budget and staffing cuts at the EPA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, cancelations of renewable energy projects, rollbacks of air, water quality standards. We're just beginning year two of the administration. Do you anticipate this is a trend that we'll continue into and through 2026?
Sen. Elissa Slotkin: Yeah. And I talked about this with Lisa and others. I think it's very important to take stock of some of the lessons learned from some of these environmental rollbacks. I mean, some of them are just gratuitous, right? Some of them are looking at certain energy sources or looking at certain programs and just labeling them "woke" and cutting them gratuitously. But on the other side of the coin, they're making some pretty major mistakes when it comes to the issue of affordability, and cutting some of those green energy projects in places like the Upper Peninsula, cutting some of these programs that are meant to protect our local communities, these are the things that will boomerang on the American people. And you're getting a whole chorus of voices coming out against some of these gratuitous cuts. And so, I think using the frame of affordability and saying, "You know? We want to protect local communities. But at the end of the day, we also can't stand our energy bills being as high as they are." We need to do something about that, and all of the above energy approach is the way we get to that. Those are some of the lessons learned that I think are important for advocating for the programs I know a lot of Michiganders care about.
David Fair: I know Lisa wants to continue down that path. I'll first remind you our First Friday Focus on the Environment conversation with US Senator Elissa Slotkin continues on 89.1 WEMU. And again, the other voice is Lisa Wozniak. She is my co-host from the Michigan League of Conservation Voters.
Lisa Wozniak: So, last year, the administration declared a so-called "energy emergency" and mandated that Consumers Energy, among other energy companies all across this country, keep open here in Michigan the J.H. Campbell coal power plant in West Michigan, which was supposed to be retired last year in May. Experts said that keeping that 63-year-old facility open would only drive up the cost of electricity and keep pollution levels high, both of which have happened. And the company itself wanted it closed. The people of Michigan wanted it closed, both because of the air pollution and the costs. What can be done to truly tackle this backwards approach to energy policy and protect our state and our nation from a greater return to a reliance on fossil fuels?
Sen. Elissa Slotkin: Yeah. I think this is a perfect example of what I was just mentioning, right? I mean, the Campbell plant out on the west side of the state, this is like a perfect of what happens when you take a broad brush approach, and you don't actually look at like the impact of what you're proposing. The plant was literally days away from decommissioning. The coal was not being transported to the plant. Literally, like, the rail lines weren't going in there anymore. They had taken equipment out of the plant. And Consumers Energy and, like you said, the community were like, this was on tap to be retired because it was too old. And the administration overrode that plan because of the President's sort of ideological obsession with this plan. And just, again, for everyone's awareness, that costs consumers now $4.3 million a week to keep running. Okay? So, what do you think happens when Consumers Energy is forced to pay $4.3 million a week for how many months now? Who do you think they passed that cost on to?
David Fair: Consumers.
Sen. Elissa Slotkin: Who is going to pay for that decision, that ideological decision? The ratepayers of Michigan. And I have Consumers. So, I think it's just important, again, there's a whole raft of environmental reasons why we want coal to be transitioned out over time when it gets too old. But, man! Right now, keeping that plant open is just going to boomerang on Michigan ratepayers, and I think we need to highlight that issue, not just the environmental issue.
David Fair: As we look at our energy future, we're going to have to take into consideration artificial intelligence and the proliferation of data centers here locally and around the country. And what role should the federal government play in supporting innovation and, at the same time, not compounding our environmental challenges and crushing rate payers with rising electricity costs?
Sen. Elissa Slotkin: Yeah. So, this is, obviously, I think, going to be the hot issue of 2026. We saw data centers bring protests and activism and good old fashioned democratic engagement at rural township council meetings and county council meetings in Michigan in the past year. I think it's only going to accelerate in 2026 because these companies have figured out that the Midwest is a good place to try and put some of these data centers. Now, the truth is we have a conundrum. We are all using more power across the board. Energy demand is going up. And then, we have this artificial intelligence race, particularly with the Chinese, that's sort of akin to the nuclear race back in the '30s and '40s. Like, whoever gets there first really does kind of dominate on this new technology. So, you have the demand going up, and you have the spotlight being put on the Midwest. But here's the thing. That AI race, in particular, shouldn't come at the expense of our local water, our utility costs, our land, all of those things. And so, we have to figure out how to put appropriate left-and-right limits on these centers. And in many cases, the decision-makers are at the hyper-local level, right? Like, again, township supervisors and councils and we have home rule in Michigan, so our smallest unit of government has a lot of power. So, we need to help those communities understand what conversations should they be having with these companies, what kind of left-and-right limits. I think there's a real problem that these companies are coming in and making everybody sign NDAs, which just makes everyone more suspicious of what's being talked about behind closed doors. The state needs to help with that. The federal government needs to provide some of those left-and-right limits. But at the end of the day, I think communication from those local officials early and often with the public and with the state and with federal level is the best way to put on some of those left-and-right limits.
Lisa Wozniak: You know, as we come to the end of our conversation, one thing that's top of mind for me is the security of our elections. And looking at the fact that we believe in the integrity of the vote and one person/one vote in this country, the President has called for a nationalization of our election. What do you think the U.S. Congress and those who run elections in Michigan can and should do to make sure we have free and fair elections here in 2026?
Sen. Elissa Slotkin: Yeah. Well, just to review the bidding, our election system was designed by our Founding Fathers to make sure that an executive--a president--couldn't dominate and take over, and ensure their own victory by taking over elections in the states. They purposely distributed the power of conducting elections, so that no one man or woman could control them from Washington. And here we have the President saying very openly the exact opposite of what our Founding Fathers proposed. So, I have a real problem with that, and I think most people do. The good news is most officials that I know, certainly in the state of Michigan, but in other states, feel very strongly that they know how to run elections, they do them to the utmost highest levels of the law, they're transparent about those things, and they will continue to the authority given in the Constitution to conduct elections. It's very dangerous when the President talks like this. He's saying the quiet part out loud, and I think we need to hear what he's saying that this is something that he is going to be interested in pursuing. And we need to make sure, at the state level and certainly across the country, that our elections officials have a stiff spine when it comes to these attempts to encroach. The state of Michigan is already one of the 20-plus states that's been asked for our voter rolls. We're pushing back on that, as are many other states doing. So, this is a very live issue, but again, regardless of whether you're a Democrat, independent or Republican, we should all believe that free and fair elections executed with the authorities given by the Constitution is the most important thing for continuing our democracy as we know it.
David Fair: With these elections in mind, you pointed out there are issues of affordability, jobs, the economy, quality of life to push forward. Will the Democratic Party prioritize environmental issues in the platform or simply wrap it into the affordability conversation?
Sen. Elissa Slotkin: Well, look. I don't know who controls the pen on that. I will just tell you that maybe it's because of my background and you got to be objective and look at the evidence, sometimes, talking about the big issues around climate change, which are so real, is almost too much for people to take when they're struggling and they can't afford to buy a home or they can afford to send their kid to summer camp. We need to meet people where they are and help them understand that those big issues that seem very far away are actually very locally controlled, very present in their lives and have a role in their kitchen table issues. And I think that's our challenge, particularly as Michiganders, is there's no more bipartisan issue than the Great Lakes, our water, and our waters, and how do we connect the big environmental issues that feel very far away to their local watershed, their river, their lake that they live on. That's our challenge is not to we can't give up on these environmental issues. Quite the opposite. But we do need to take lessons learned from the last 20 years and say, "You know what?" The way that we get people engaged on these issues is by meeting them where they are, not asking them to about something that's not like kind of in their next six months. So, that's something I try to do is environmental issues are local issues and they're national security issues. And we should talk about them as such.
David Fair: Senator Slotkin, thank you so much for making time today and starting out the year with us on WEMU's First Friday Focus on the Environment!
Sen. Elissa Slotkin: Happy to be here! Thanks, guys!
David Fair: That is Michigan Senator Elissa Slotkin. And Lisa Wozniak is the other voice you've been hearing. She is the CEO and President of the Michigan League of Conservation Voters and co-host of WEMU's First Fridays. Lisa, I'm always happy to share time with you, and we'll see you next month!
Lisa Wozniak: I look forward to it, David!
David Fair: I'm David Fair, and this is your community NPR station, 89.1 WEMU-FM Ypsilanti.
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