The Environment Receding As A Public Concern

May 9, 2011: How the Public Thinks About the Environment

By Lee Drutman at Ten Miles Square, a blog at Washington Monthly

The environment now ranks last among 15 issues that the public thinks Congress and the President should deal with this year. Only 24 percent of Americans think the environment is an “extremely important” issue. On this score, the environment comes in behind “the situation in Iraq” (27 percent), “taxes” (27 percent), and “illegal immigration” (30 percent) and “gas and home heating prices” (31 percent).