The Earth is sizzling, but ‘climate hushing’ is hot right now among Democrats. ‘People are increasingly freaked out about other issues’

Climate change has been the backdrop to Charles Hughes’ entire life, from kindergarten lessons about disappearing habitats to wildfire smoke billowing through the air he breathed while growing up in Colorado.

But now that he’s a college student in Massachusetts, he said global warming is rarely a top issue.

“Honestly, it doesn’t come up as much,” said Hughes, who chairs the state’s chapter of the College Democrats.

What a difference six years makes.

During President Donald Trump’s first term and especially during the Democratic primaries to determine who would run against him in 2020, Democrats spoke constantly about climate change.

They used it to rally young voters such as Hughes, fueling protests and sweeping demands to remake the economy with proposals like the Green New Deal .

But there has been a national shift in the conversation that is sharp enough for some researchers to coin the term “climate hushing” to describe it.

The Searchlight Institute, a Democratic think tank, urged the party to stop mentioning climate change because it is not a priority for voters.

The Sunrise Movement, a left-wing group that pushed global warming as a top issue for young people, switched its mission last fall to a broader mandate of fighting the Republican president.

The shift is encapsulated by the Democratic primary for U.S.

Senate in Massachusetts on Tuesday as the incumbent, Ed Markey, 80, tries to fend off a challenge from U.S.

Rep.

Seth Moulton, 47.

Although Markey still talks about sponsoring the Green New Deal, his campaign is more focused on other issues to burnish his left-wing bona fides and prove to voters that he is not too old for the job.