Even though the topic wasn’t on a list of designated subjects Fox News anchor and debate moderator Chris Wallace released ahead of last night’s debate, Wallace engaged the candidates in an 11-minute conversation about the climate crisis. Out of the 73 questions or follow-ups Wallace posed to President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden, 10 of them, or 14%, were about climate change or the environment.

Although the questions were a mixed bag, the fact that climate was raised at all during a general election debate speaks to the reality of an accelerating climate crisis playing out in real time and growing public concern about the consequences of climate change. It’s also a testament to the work of climate and environmental groups that have been organizing intensely to raise awareness of these issues and calling for climate change to be a centerpiece of the presidential debates.

During the most recent Democratic primary debates, less than 7% of the questions were about climate change or the environment -- just 83 out of 1,208. In two of the 11 Democratic primary debates, moderators failed to ask a single climate question. In the 2016 presidential primary debates, only 1.5% of the questions were about climate change -- a mere 22 questions out of 1,477 in total. Moderators that year, including Chris Wallace, also didn't pose a single climate question during the three general election debates between then candidates Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton.

In addition to his previous debate performance, Wallace has a history of downplaying or ignoring the climate crisis. His show, Fox News Sunday, was the only Sunday morning political show to not report on the West Coast wildfires on September 13. In addition, Fox News Sunday featured only 14 minutes of climate coverage in 2019, which included a particularly egregious segment where Wallace repeatedly asked right-wing radio personality Rush Limbaugh if the Green New Deal is “socialist,” and allowed him to spew rank climate denial.

With this in mind, there were low expectations for Chris Wallace’s debate performance. He managed to clear this incredibly low bar by raising the issue of climate change and environmental policy, even though many of his questions were focused on the costs of climate action versus inaction.

Wallace asked a fair amount of climate questions, but many of them weren’t that good

Wallace began the climate portion of the debate by noting that the current wildfires have devastated the West Coast before pressing Trump about his rejection of climate science and the role that belief plays in his ongoing environmental rollbacks.

After asking Trump again about what he believes “about the science of climate change,” he then tied Trump’s answer to his rollback of Obama-era EPA regulations including the Clean Power Plan and clean car standards.

While Wallace did a decent job of pressing Trump on how his views of climate science squared with his administration's aggressive environmental deregulation, he spent the rest of the climate portion pressing Biden on the cost of his climate plan and whether his opponent was right that it “would tank the economy.”

Wallace followed up with another question couched in Trump’s critique that you have to, as Wallace summarized, “balance environmental interests and economic interests” before delving specifically into Biden’s climate plan. There, he echoed and amplified Fox News’ dishonest critiques that Biden’s proposals would “hurt the economy.”

He ended the segment with a question about Biden’s support for the Green New Deal without bothering to specify any of the aims or provisions of the ambitious climate resolution or how Biden’s plan is similar to, or differs from, the Green New Deal.

This series of questions evinced a deep skepticism of the efficacy of climate action. But this is no surprise, as Fox News has long been a key cog in the fossil fuel industry’s decades-long, billion-plus-dollar campaigns to erode the public consensus on climate change, thwart any climate action that could impact its bottom line, and fool the public about the industry’s commitment to addressing the climate crisis.

Despite the mixed quality of Wallace’s questions, he did get some credit for making climate change a topic

Wallace received some credit for making climate a surprise topic during last night’s contentious debate.

Wallace made climate change a topic because public pressure made it impossible for him to ignore it

Polling shows that not only is the climate crisis top of mind for many Americans, but they also want to hear climate change discussed during the debates. According to a Pew Research survey released in April, 62% of respondents indicated that climate change was affecting their community, while 64% of respondents said that “protecting the environment should be a top priority for the president and Congress.”

When it comes to the debates, a recent survey conducted by George Mason University’s Center for Climate Change Communication found that 74% of registered voters want the debate moderators to ask the candidates climate questions. And a petition circulated by 45 climate and environment organizations to demand that the debate moderators ask about climate change has garnered nearly 200,000 thousand signatures, as well as the backing of significant numbers of senators and representatives.

In addition to public demand, there were also growing calls from news outlets for more substantive climate discussions in debates. As Mark Hertsgaard, executive director of Covering Climate Now, wrote in The Nation:

Surprisingly, the clarion calls from climate-focused journalists and publications have been echoed by a number of mainstream news outlets. The Washington Post published a September 24 opinion piece by syndicated columnist and former New York Times public editor Margaret Sullivan that read:

An article published by Wired, noting that Wallace had excluded climate change from his list of debate topics, quipped, “To which I say, on behalf of humanity: You have got to be kidding me.”  

And on September 28, MSNBC host Craig Melvin lamented the fact that climate change wasn’t one of Wallace’s featured topics despite record-breaking hurricane and wildfire seasons.

By raising this urgent issue, Wallace heeded the calls of millions of viewers and voters who wanted to hear a substantive discussion of how candidates plan to mitigate the worst consequences of climate change and environmental pollution. Although that’s not exactly what they saw, Wallace set a new precedent by breaking general debates’ long-running silence on climate change. And climate organizers, congressional climate champs, and activists can claim a well-deserved victory in the ongoing struggle to center climate change in vital public policy discussions.

Because of the attention and scrutiny the debates attract, for the first time in 12 years, an audience of millions was able to see the presidential nominees answer questions about their approaches to addressing climate and environmental pollution. Although last night’s debate did not provide viewers with the truly substantive discussion the climate crisis deserves, it set the stage for upcoming debate moderators to improve on Wallace’s performance.

Methodology

In counting the number of questions asked by debate moderators, Media Matters includes invitations to candidates to make responses, as well as follow-up questions to the same candidate on the same topic. We do not include invitations to make opening or closing statements. We also do not include interjections or clarifications from the moderators unless they are interjections to allow a different candidate to speak.