It looks like Floridians would rather have all the scientists run for president than Marco Rubio, according to a Public Policy Polling survey released last week.
After the White House released the findings from the National Climate Assessment last month that said climate change was man-made and that Florida was sinking into the ocean, Sen. Marco Rubio stepped up to the plate to lash out against science and reason.
Rubio questioned the reasons for running with just what scientists say, and that all that dirty CO2 that's coming from nuclear plants and wrecking the environment really isn't all man's fault.
"I think it's an enormous threat to say that every weather incident that we now read about is -- or the majority of them are -- attributable to human activity," Rubio told CNN in an interview following the National Climate Assessment findings.
See also: Marco Rubio Is Ignoring Threats to South Florida's Environment
But, as the poll results show, Floridians are more trusting of people who actually do science type things for a living more than politicians who have actually admitted they're no scientists.
According to the PPP survey, Florida voters trust scientists more than Marco by 56 percent to 33 percent.
Rubio has admitted that scientists are right about climate change, but has vehemently questioned man's roll in it. Rubio has also tried to turn all this climate change talk back onto the Obama administration, wondering of spending money on trying to keep places like Florida from going all Lost Continent of Atlantis is fiscally responsible.
"[The President] is proposing a certain set of policies that he would have to admit, if questioned, will do nothing," Rubio told CNN last month. "If in fact the scientists are right and it's greenhouse gas emissions that are changing our climate, none of things he is proposing would do anything to change that whatsoever, but it would have a devastating impact on our economy."
One of the propositions the president has made, via recommendations from the Environmental Protection Agency, is to have carbon dioxide emissions cut from the nation's power plants by 30 percent by 2030. In Florida, that would mean plants cutting its carbon emissions by 38 percent -- about a third of what we're creating now.
Florida's power plants produce 1,200 pounds of carbon pollution per megawatt hour of electricity. Under their 645-page plan, the state would need to bring that down to 740 pounds by 2030, according to the EPA.
The National Climate Assessment findings released last month found that South Florida, in particular, is "exceptionally vulnerable to sea level rise."
Meanwhile, Rubio has found allies in his own party here in Florida that question scientists, and ask the real questions.
Like Rep. Jeff Miller, who told a morning show on Monday that it's foolish to believe in climate change.
"Why did the dinosaurs go extinct?" Miller asks MSNBC host Richard Lui. "Were there men that were causing - were there cars running around at that point that were causing global warming? No. The climate has changed since Earth was created."
As for the PPP survey, Americans United for Change issued a press release saying that, according to the survey, "voters have little tolerance for a Presidential candidate in 2016 who doesn't believe that climate change is caused by human activity."
"This issue could be particularly problematic for Senator Marco Rubio given his recent comments on it," the statement adds. "Republicans risk putting themselves in an even deeper hole with independent voters by continuing to express their skepticism, and it has the potential to help cost them yet another Presidential election in 2016."
See the Public Policy Polling results below:
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