Doug Mastriano
Doug, Doug, Doug. Oh, Dougie boy. The MAGA-loving Pennsylvania state senator surprised us in May with a big surprise win in a packed primary for governor. As recently as April, Mastriano hosted a Facebook live in which he called climate change “pop science” and dismissed the link between fossil fuels and warming as “theory.”
“Heck, the weatherman can’t get the weather right 24 hours out,” he reportedly said in the video.
Apparently, however, Doug realized that this might be a bit too much for some voters, and the video, along with 13 others on controversial topics, were deleted by mid-July.
Mastriano himself has kept quiet on climate since winning the nomination. Beyond just climate denial, his candidacy represents some much larger general concerns for our overall democracy as he campaigns on a platform of election denial and bad information. (Mastriano attended the January 6 insurrection, if that gives you any idea of what his politics are like beyond climate.) As the Daily Beast reported, a meme page that’s filled with “xenophobic, transphobic, and antisemitic” content was allegedly run by Mastriano’s campaign. If so, that meme page would confirm that he’s still deep in denier land, with a meme poking fun at scientists at predicting “the weather…in 100 years” posted recently..
Rating: 9/10 for relatability. We’ve all posted something embarrassing on social media that we’ve then had to hastily delete.
