On the Campaign Trail: The Human Right to Water

The issue of clean drinking water is in the mix during this Democratic primary campaign season, but not all candidates go so far as to identify it as a human right.

Andrew Yang has defined the issue most clearly.  Found on his website is a policy statement directly addressing the human right to clean water.  Citing Flint, Michigan, Yang says:  “It’s time that America declares safe drinking water a fundamental right. We need to build up water infrastructure in our cities and small towns to make sure no one has to worry if the water they see their child drinking will make them sick or damage their brain.” 

Democratic candidate Elizabeth Warren has also recognized the human right to clean water, folding it into her environmental justice plan. 

Bernie Sanders says that he will enact legislation to guarantee clean drinking water as a human right.

For Pete Buttigieg, clean drinking water seems to be a matter of freedom, rather than individual human rights per se.

For Joe Biden,  clean water is an important policy issue, something that governments should provide as part of an environmental agenda, but he doesn’t seem to address it in terms of rights.

Amy Klobuchar, hailing from Minnesota, the Land of 1000 Lakes, has a record of legislation promoting clean water, but also seems to have stopped short of identifying clean drinking water as a human right,  

And Tom Steyer points the finger at corporations for polluting our natural resources and undermining individual rights.  Linking clean drinking water to climate change, he argues that “[i]f our Right to Clean Air and Clean Water were guaranteed, we would have attacked global warming long before the current crisis by strictly regulating the greenhouse gases that cause it.”