(Radio Iowa) — Democratic presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke says historic droughts, wildfires, hurricanes AND flooding illustrate why climate change is the greatest challenge the country faces. “Climate change is…understood to be happening beyond a shadow of a doubt for at least anyone who listens to the scientists or who lives in Pacific Junction or Davenport or Houston, Texas,” O’Rourke says. O’Rourke, a former Texas congressman, has unveiled a plan to spend five TRILLION dollars over the next decade to address climate change. During a forum Monday afternoon in Des Moines, O’Rourke said there’s an “economic upside in doing the right thing” and farmers can play a key role in meeting the challenges climate change presents. “Not be dictating to them, but by partnering with them, listening to them, allowing them to provide the public service of capturing and storing more carbon on their land and then paying them for the public benefit that we receive from that,” O’Rourke says.

O’Rourke says flood prevention or “mitigation” is part of his climate action plan — and that means reconstructing and fortifying Missouri and Mississippi River levees to protect life and property. “We can pay the cost of clean-up, of repair, of replacement or we can invest upfront,” O’Rourke says.

O’Rourke visited a farm near Pacific Junction this past weekend. “It’s a lake right now or at least some significant part of it is,” O’Rourke says. “Those farmers in some cases already underwater in terms of their debt are now, literally, underwater in terms of their farms,” O’Rourke says.  O’Rourke supports efforts in congress to offer some financial help to farmers with uninsured grain that was stored in bins, swamped and spoiled by the floodwaters. O’Rourke will campaign in Adel, Boone, Waverly, Charles City and Fayette today (Tuesday).