In North Carolina, hurricanes did what scientists could not: Convince Republicans that climate chang

In North Carolina, hurricanes did what scientists could not: Convince Republicans that climate change is real

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/in-north-carolina-hurricanes-do-what-scientists-could-not-persuade-republicans-that-climate-change-is-real/2018/10/17/45136c56-d0ac-11e8-8c22-fa2ef74bd6d6_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.c1257c8b6201

WILMINGTON, N.C. — It took a giant laurel oak puncturing her roof during Hurricane Florence last month for Margie White to consider that perhaps there was some truth to all the alarm bells over global warming.

“I always thought climate change was a bunch of nonsense, but now I really do think it is happening,” said White, a 65-year-old Trump supporter, as she and her young grandson watched workers haul away downed trees and other debris lining the streets of her posh seaside neighborhood last week, just as Hurricane Michael made landfall 700 miles away in the Florida Panhandle.

Storms have grown more frequent — and more intense — over the 26 years she and her husband have lived in Wilmington, White said, each one chipping away at their skepticism. Climate change has even seeped into their morning conversations as they sip coffee — ever since the neighbor’s tree came crashing onto their home and property, coming to rest along nearly the entire length of their driveway.

While President Trump continued this week to deny the effects of climate change in the face of overwhelming scientific agreement that it is occurring — most recently noted in a landmark United Nations report that he has dismissed — a discernible shift appears to be occurring among Republican voters in North Carolina, a state pummeled by two hurricanes in two years.

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