In an election defined by affordability concerns, a climate group is emerging as one of the biggest independent spenders in support of Democrats this year.
The League of Conservation Voters, a nonprofit dedicated to environmentalism and combating climate change, is raising its spending total to $110 million this year through its affiliated groups. The investment is in support of Democratic House and Senate candidates in highly competitive elections and makes LCV one of the biggest spenders in the 2026 elections giving to Democrats.
The group’s investment in ads, mailers and field organizers includes seven Senate races, with a particular emphasis on Ohio, where former Sen. Sherrod Brown is challenging Republican incumbent Sen. Jon Husted. The group is also spending in 30 House districts, 27 of which President Donald Trump won in 2024, and a number of state legislative and governor races in Arizona, Maine, Michigan Minnesota, and Wisconsin.
While climate change was a defining issue for Democrats under President Joe Biden, it has largely receded from the party’s discourse, with polling and focus groups suggesting it was too abstract to drive voters to the polls. In response, the LCV Victory Fund plans to focus its message on the environmental issues directly affecting voters, including water pollution, high electricity costs and data centers.
“We are meeting voters where they are, and they are telling us that they are being crushed by their energy costs,” Sara Schreiber, LCV’s senior vice president of campaigns, said in an interview. “A solution to that is bringing clean energy on to the grid, which is the fastest and cheapest way to grow our energy source in this country, and it is absolutely connected with climate change and reducing emissions.”
Coming out of the 2024 elections, Democrats have criticized their own party for failing to transform their climate-centered policy into votes. Under Biden, the Democratic-controlled Congress passed the largest-ever investment to combat climate change through the Inflation Reduction Act and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. Most of the investments came through tax credits for renewable energy — complex policy that the party struggled to communicate to voters.
“For public sentiment to prevail, people have to know,” former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in an interview, calling what the party accomplished under Biden on climate “remarkable.” “We really didn’t have the bully pulpit used to the fullest to say what we had done.”
Republicans have attacked Democrats’ climate agenda as hiking energy prices by prioritizing renewables over fossil fuels. Under the One Big Beautiful Bill, Republicans repealed or scaled back many of the tax credits for renewables passed under Biden.
Some Democratic candidates have beefed up their support for domestic oil and gas as part of their message on lowering costs. Former congresswoman Mary Peltola, who is making a competitive bid for the Senate in Alaska, made embracing her state’s oil and gas industry a cornerstone of her campaign, for example.
LCV, long affiliated with Democrats, focuses on candidates aligned with its mission to protect the environment. Peltola is not on its list of beneficiaries.
The group shifts the blame for high energy costs and a botched energy transition to Republicans and fossil fuel companies. It announced early this summer a plan to target the “energy bill voter,” referring to voters who generally don’t follow politics, or who aren’t aligned with a political party, but are driven by concerns over high utility bills.
Other Democratic candidates and groups have tapped into the same demographic. New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill (D) proposed an emergency moratorium on utility price increases as part of her 2025 campaign. She won her race by more than 14 percentage points.
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