a nice surprise. democrats are celebrating huge wins today as abortion rights dry.

to the polls. but how much will that really boost president biden in his reelection bid? and speaking of elections, stanford athletes are doing the opposite of shut up and dribble. try speak up and vote. as stanford designers movement to turn college athletes into drivers for civic engagement. but first, going the wrong way to slow climate change. a new un report shows nations that promise to take action are actually expanding fossil fuel use. you're watching getting answers. i'm kristen sze. thanks for joining us. that report found the world is on track to produce more coal, oil and gas than what climate scientists say would keep us at safe levels of global warming. so what exactly does that mean for our future? joining us live now to discuss this, the co-lead author of this un report, michael lazarus, senior scientist and director of the us center of the stockholm environment institute. thank you so much for joining us today. really appreciate it. >> thank you, kristin. thanks for having me on.

>> so your report set out to explore promises of climate action, right? versus the reality of what they've done. is that right? >> well, we mostly looked at what governments are planning to do in terms of fossil fuel production, production, in particular coal, oil and gas. and we found that they're planning to produce over double the amount that would be consistent with the targets for controlling the climate change that were agreed to in the paris agreement. >> let's go ahead and throw up the numbers, because i think that is very eye opening. some numbers that you guys shared with us in your findings as you looked at these 20 major fossil fuel producing nations. explain what we're looking at here in terms of coal, oil and gas use. >> okay. all right. so we looked in our study at global coal, oil and gas production and this chart looks to me to be us coal,

oil and gas production. that blue line, as you can see on the left, is coal. and in coal, things are moving in the right direction. we have been transitioning away from coal in the us and we expect to see global coal use peak this decade and it's on a declining trajectory. and that red line you see there from today out to 2050 shows us a continued decline. not as much as we'd like to see. um, when we look to oil and gas, it's a different story. we wait. >> are we going the wrong way? and actually increasing our use of oil and gas? >> well, okay, let's make a distinction here. we focus on production in production in what countries are planning to do with production. so if you look at what we project to do in terms of using fossil fuels, we actually are on a trajectory to significantly reduce oil and eventually gas use. and that comes in part from the policies

that we've seen past recently, like the inflation reduction act. yeah, but the problem is we're planning to produce more. and what are we going to do with that? we're we're hoping i think, and at here. and the two are global temperatures. >> as we looked at 20 countries and the us, should viewers should be aware, is the number one oil and gas producer globally. now, number four, i believe in coal and what we're seeing here is global. the emissions associated with producing fossil fuels and using them and the red line is when you add up what governments are planning and projecting, it's an increase all the way out to 2030, slowly declining, largely because of coal planning. coal plants phase out and what you

see at the purple line at the bottom is what we need to get to achieve the goals of the paris agreement and keep climate change in check. and that's to keep global warming under 1.5°c or 2.7°f. okay. >> let's leave this graphic up here, because i think there's a lot to explore here. if we can keep it at only going up by 1.5°c in the world as our global average temperature. what does that mean for the way we live and the disasters and the resources versus if we were at 2, two degrees celsius warmer? >> okay. all right. great question. so today we're about 1.2. we've already warmed the planet in july 2023 was the hottest month in ever recorded, perhaps in the past 100,000 years. so up to 1.5 we'll see worsening wildfires and droughts and heatwaves. um but there's a

big difference between 1.5 and 2 degrees. two degrees is the other target in the paris agreement is well below two degrees and aiming for 1.52 degrees means we'll probably lose almost all of the world's coral reefs. climate change just works significantly worse every 10th of a degree we see get increase. so you know, it matters a lot whether we can hit 1.5, even 1.6 or 1.7, because 1.5 is going to be hard. but every 10th of a degree matters. >> can i? okay ask one more scary question, and that is if we stay at the red line. right. and that's the projection. if we kind of go this this way in terms of how we're producing these fossil fuels, what what degree is that consistent with increase? you know, we actually didn't calculate that. >> we did not calculate that. noel you know, it's if you look at the at the gold line, i believe that's about 2.7 degrees. if you look at that

dotted gold line, it's about 1.8 to 2.2 degrees. you can deduce from that. and so we're talking if we don't get this into check, doubling over well, doubling over what we've seen so far and the damages get worse and worse. so why 2050? >> why is that the end point in this chart? and what you studied? >> well, you know, there's only so far you can look when you have sort of a sense of what folks are planning for investments made now. and this is the key thing, investments we make now. if we build out more oil and gas production facilities, more coal mines and coal plants, those last for 30 years, they last of all, some last for ten, 20, 30 years. and that's the lifetime of these investments. that's why it's important that we change course. now >> now. so is there any evidence that the proper investment outs are being made that encourage you? >> yes, there there is there are promising signs of change. we've

seen renewable energy grow much faster than anyone ever predicted. we're seeing investments in clean energy grow quickly, but not fast enough. um, we need to see a global tripling of renewable energy by the end of this decade. and remarkably, some countries are on track for that. um, you know, we need a doubling of the rate of energy efficiency improvements we're not really on track for that. and we need to stop investing in new oil and gas and coal facilities. >> is it possible for countries to phase out the use of fossil fuels altogether on the horizon? i mean, given our technology today? >> that's a great question. yeah i mean, the answer is if you look at the scientific reports and the technology reports, we're on a decent trajectory. if we go all in, we might be able to get there by 2050. that's why 2050 is a key year. it's the

year that the scientists have said we need to get to net zero emissions. that's when we need to be aiming for phase out of coal and a near phase out of oil and gas. um, and we've got time to get there, but we need to move fast. >> all right, michael lazarus, senior scientist and director of the us center of the stockholm environment institute, thank you for coming on today and thank you so much for taking time for this important question. >> thanks. >> it's coming up next. election night gave democrats plenty to celebrate with huge wins across the country, but is it enough to give president biden a boost for his own challenging reelection? we'll explore what's driving voter sentiment. and look at a new poll on biden. trump that match up in

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governor's office to enshrine abortion rights in ohio by wide margin. democrats won many decisive victories across the country. but do these wins translate into support for president biden in his own reelection? he needs a boost at a new berkeley igs poll out today shows biden's job approval ratings declining to an all time low. even in california. he's underwater here for the first time, 52% disapprove of his performance. only 44% approve of. joining us live now to break it all down for us is dr. nolan higdon, professor of history and communication at california state university, east bay. dr. higdon, nice to have you back on. thank you, rodney. first, let's talk about the democratic wins. what drove them? >> well, there's a couple of factors. some of the most

consequential seem to be abortion issue that continues to drive voters out to support the democrats that you've seen a handful of states. dobbs decision. it also seems that the democrats did a pretty good job of fundraising. >> dr. higdon, i'm going to put you on hold because the audio sounds like you're in a little box or can it's like very warbled. i'm not sure if there's something you can quickly try to fix. if not, we'll take a short break and we'll try to reconnect and deal with that. >> how about that? is that a little better? >> oh, that is so much better. we're resolving our own tech issues just like that. thank you so much. okay so again, what do you think drove the voters to the polls? and the reason for some of the democratic wins? >> yeah, it seems like abortion continues to be a major factor that's driving people out to support the democratic party and that's also related to another issue which been contributed to the democratic party's victory,

and that is fundraising. democrats were able to out fundraise republicans overall and i think that made a consequential difference, especially in a lot of those races that were very close. >> where is the issue of abortion rights resonating most? is it the battleground battleground states? as you know previously, be purple or red areas because obviously, if that issue is making headways in the red areas that means a lot more to democrats. >> absolutely. i think it's resonating all over. i mean, i don't think we're too surprised that california and vermont voters overwhelmingly supported abortion rights. but then, you know, states like ohio and kansas were pretty shocking that voters actually turned out for abortion rights there. so it seems to be an issue that that's driving out voters across the country, no matter the color of the state. >> all right. what about when we look at kentucky, where the democratic governor, andy beshear, won reelection in a state that's about as red as california as blue, what are the key takeaways there in terms of what works, what doesn't work?

>> well, someone's born in the state. i've a lot of knowledge of this area and it seems like beshear definitely benefited from name recognition. certainly but even more than that, he ran what a lot of people have called kind of like the boring democrat that is a governor who tried not to excite or alienate voters too much in his governorship. and that proved to be quite consequential. beshear was not such a controversial figure within the states where we see a lot of politicians trying to get as controversial as possible, to get maybe more social media attention or news attention, but sure seems to be cut from a different cloth. >> so, i mean, i know you can never make too much out of one race, but if you were to kind of extrapolate and say, we're going to revise our playbook, looking at these wins and losses, would you guess maybe democrats might go in that direction? let's be boring, you know, bread and butter issues. might republicans say we're going to lay off on anti-trans and anti abortion rights policies. right. because i know that that was an issue in

kentucky as well. and people didn't go for it. >> well, republicans have certainly backed themselves into a corner and they're in the midst of a republican primary. and those primary voters are going to want to continue to hear the anti-abortionist message from republicans. so i think we're going to hear that message continue to be amplified throughout the primary, which is probably going to alienate a lot of voters throughout the country . as far as as democrats go, they're also in an interesting situation where there was a lot of polling this week that showed joe biden falling behind donald trump and the presidential run, but it didn't seem to affect any of the other democrats down ballot in this race. so it's not really clear if that polling is going to be representative of what will happen in november of 24. >> but what i'm interested in is could there be an up ballot effect where it benefits biden right. because like you said, the polls this week don't look great for him in a head to head with trump. and then we have the berkeley igs poll that we showed earlier that we can put up

again, just to give viewers a look at these numbers in california, even where biden had always done super well, i mean, of course he still leads trump, but look at his rating. it is now 52% disapprove in very democratic california. and now he's only leading trump by 15 points here, whereas he won 20, 20 by 30 points. how does last night change his outlook if, if at all? >> well, i think the polling that we're seeing now for biden certainly is probably a wake up call for the party and the campaign. but we also need to remember there's a lot of variables that could change by november of 24. i mean, a lot of the polls that showed biden behind, if you to ask those very same people if they'd vote for biden or trump, if trump was convicted, biden actually ended up leading in the polls. so if trump gets convicted, that could be consequential. also, there are some third party candidates, including rfk jr at some polls have him at 20 to 22. who knows if that'll sustain and if that will continue into the general. and i think due to variables

like that, it's really too early to see how accurate these polls are. >> right. and of course, there are a lot of world events that could affect how people view the president, right. whether it's republican or democrat, you tend to get the blame when something goes wrong and get the credit when things go well. but i wonder, is there evidence that previous presidents have been in this position before at this point in their reelection where they're down, but then they came back to win and maybe even pretty handily, some sometimes, yes, those in office can be down. >> but to my recollection, modern history, never by this much, nor was there a third party candidates polling so high as well. i mean, even ross perot, i think, barely broke 20, if he did at all in 1992. um, so i don't know how much the historical record is going to be helpful in understanding this election. and again, there's things like, you know, trump facing indictments and possibly jail time, which is something we've never seen in presidential elections before. so i don't think history offers us a lot of guidance here. >> look, and just to end this,

on last night, again, looking at the democratic wins, it certainly seems to suggest if you want to extrapolate that voters and some of those states really resonate with some of the democratic platform, traditional issues. but but it seems like there's a disconnect and biden's not really getting credit for them, if you know what i mean. yeah >> for you know, a lot of the polling shows that that people have concerns about biden's age and cognitive abilities and age in particular is something that is really tough to overcome because, you know, it is it is a set number. so that's something that biden's campaign is going to have to really contemplate. how can we change the image that people have of his age, um, enough to maybe shift some of those independent or republican voters back to his camp in 2024? >> yeah. all right. that is a conundrum for them to solve. dr. nolan higdon with cal state, east bay, thank you very much. thank you. coming up, stanford democracy day. student athletes

take action to inspire everyone on campus to vote. but the movement doesn't just end just because election day is over. we'll explain next from the state that's already helped millions of people like you get and pay for health insurance. with financial health to lower the cost of health coverage, you could get a quality health plan for less than $10 a month. every plan covers preventive care, doctor visits, emergency care, and more. if you have questions, we're here to help

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which are, of course, still very important. instead of practicing on the field or court yesterday, stanford athletes did something to promote civic engagement from women's water polo to men's basketball. the players took part in all vote no play democracy day. if you haven't heard of the movement, it was born out of the stanford design school, a nationally renowned center for innovation and design thinking. joining us live now are lisa solomon, stanford, lecturer, d.school designer in residence and co-founder of the team. and josue gil silva, stanford basketball player who led the event yesterday. lisa and josue, thank you for coming on the show. >> oh, kristin, it is so great to be here to talk about what

happened yesterday, not only at stanford, but around the country. and i'm thrilled that hosoi could join us, too. >> i know i can't wait to hear having us. i know. so exciting. lisa, why don't you first tell us what is the stanford d.school and what is the team for folks who don't know? >> absolutely. so the stanford d.school affectionately called the d.school is really the hasso plattner institute of design. and we teach classes and help students develop creative confidence by going after complex challenges and applied ways where they could flex their creative thinking skills. and at the d.school i teach classes on future thinking and applied imagination. so helping students feel like that they have more agency over future that promises to be more complex and filled with more uncertainty. and it was from that that i started to get involved in civics in innovative ways to really reimagine how we might engage our young audience. and there's a number of steps that happened between my teaching at the school and the team, but really found that there was a lot of energy for finding new ways to

engage young audiences. his and the team's work is really focused on helping student athletes learn how to flex their civic muscles, trying to make the connection that the skills and disciplines and mindsets that they learn in the locker room. being a good teammate to each other is exactly the kind of things we need for democracy. >> jose, i want to hear about that from you, but by the way, was that andrew luck in the photo? who was talking? who was that? andrew luck yes, it is. >> that was our keynote speaker actually yesterday. so kind of to give you guys a rundown of how it went yesterday, we had a panel of five different student athletes. i was hosting the panel and then one of my assistant coaches, jesse pruitt, was able to introduce our keynote speaker, andrew luck. so he gave a great speech talking about kind of like different values of teamwork, like playing in a sport and how you can apply that to kind of give back to your community in a broader way. so i think it was really cool to kind of learn, learn from him such an accomplished athlete who played number one pick in the nfl, stanford hall of famer. you know, he really is the motto for

like what it means to be a stanford athlete. and i feel like he was the perfect person to kind of speak on that. and especially today, like democracy day, we really want to kind of focus on civic engagement, giving back to the broader stanford community. he's the perfect person to have as a speaker. >> so tell me how you as an athlete feel the sense of responsibility, like kind of the power and privilege and the position platform that you have and how you can use that to drive people to vote right? engaging in democracy, talk about that 100. >> i really feel like as athletes, we do have a platform where like we say something and people listen, right? you can even see like different how different athletes are like professional athletes are able to kind of use their platform to speak for what they believe in. i think even as college athletes now with and even like with i guess like we get more attention through social media, we're able to kind of like advocate for what we believe in. so i feel like it's really important for us to do that, to use our voices and kind of advocate for what we believe in. like the thing from yesterday was championing for change. so kind of like stanford is the home of champions and champions. it means to win also like win games on the court

right? but it also means to kind of advocate for what you believe in, what you think is right. so i feel like that was more what we're trying to do kind of promote that for athletes to be like really get involved in the community, whether it's doing community service, whether it's like joining different service organizations that exist around the surrounding areas and also voting like democracy. that's like the main point of it, right? like you really you'd be surprised like how many people aren't registered to vote, which is why we had a booth there from stanford votes where like ensuring that people registered, registered to vote and know when the elections are especially with a presidential election coming up next year. it's important to spread awareness for that and that people are prepared for that and know are a little bit more educated, like when the days are to vote and how to how to actually register to do that for sure. >> josue i love the motto of the team. democracy is not a spectator sport, right? full participant. an endeavor that demands everybody get on the field. i love that. lisa i know you do a lot of designing projects and one of them is designing the president right. speaking of the election next year, what does that mean? it's a way for us that you want us to

all think about how we pick a president. can you kind of walk us through how that works and what we should be thinking about? >> absolutely, kristin. and it just brings me so much joy to hear his talk about engaging student athletes to flex from a standpoint of positivity and what their strengths are right? exactly. everything that they're learning about being a teammate and then really flexing that as a citizen. and that very much connects to the initial class that i taught at stanford before the 2020 election was an experiment. it was called designing the president. and the basic idea was what if we're going about helping young voters vote? wrong, right? we tend to expect them to know how to vote. and then we start really guilting them and shaming them into voting. and we don't take the time. >> 20s lisa, how can we help you think like a voter? >> so design, the president says what is the job that needs to be done that you are thinking about as a president? what makes them great and how do you think about the leadership qualities that would allow someone to do that job? well i see. >> all right. and that gets us

away from kind of the he versus like us versus them. right. really think about the qualities. i love it. lisa solomon and josue gil silva, thank you both for coming on today. >> thanks so much for having us. >> all right. we'll take a short welcome to big tobacco's fantasyland. a new, healthier world without cigarettes. as long as you don't count the 6 trillion sold worldwide every year. and vaping won't lead to smoking,

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if you have questions, we're here to help every step of the way. covered california. this way to health insurance. enroll by december 31 at coveredca.com. around the bay. bye tonight, breaking news as we come on the air. the u.s. launching air strikes in syria. what the pentagon has just revealed. we just learned tonight the u.s. war planes launching those retaliatory strikes on a weapons storage facility in syria. after iranian-backed forces