Tom Carper is the senior U.S. Senator from the State of Delaware. He has been in public service since 1976, being elected as Delaware's State Treasurer, U.S. Congressman, and Governor before coming to the U.S. Senate in 2001. He is also the sole Vietnam War veteran currently serving in the U.S. Senate.
Senator Carper has served on the Environment and Public Works Committee since 2001. During his time on the committee, he has pushed to advance and defend commonsense policies that keep communities safe from harmful pollution and protect the environment while supporting job creation and economic growth. Senator Carper has spent his career working to advance bipartisan, lasting solutions to the problems facing the American people. His ability to work across party lines, yet never compromise his principles, has earned him a reputation as a consensus-builder.
Carper led the effort to enact the Diesel Emissions Reduction Act, which has cleaned up millions of old, dirty diesel engines to help save lives and improve public health. He helped broker the compromise that created our country’s highest fuel efficiency standards in a generation, saving Americans billions of dollars at the pump. Carper also successfully fought to enact a nationwide phasedown of powerful greenhouse gases known as hydrofluorocarbons under a Republican-controlled Senate and White House.
Senator Carper strongly believes in our moral obligation to be good stewards of the planet and to follow the golden rule. That is why he is focused on advancing policies that put our country on a path to achieving net-zero emissions economy-wide by 2050 and leave no community behind in the process. As Chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee, he is committed to passing comprehensive legislation that rebuilds our nation’s infrastructure, addresses the climate crisis, and improves the quality of life for all Americans.
