Biden is urged to release insurers’ climate data before leaving office

By Thomas Frank | 12/23/2024 06:18 AM EST

Treasury is doing an unprecedented analysis of climate change and property insurance. Advocates want the information before Trump takes power.

President Joe Biden boards Marine One at Delaware Air National Guard Base in Delaware last week.

President Joe Biden launched an examination of climate change's effects on property insurance in 2021. Ben Curtis/AP

Consumer advocate Douglas Heller was looking for reassurance when he asked a Biden administration official recently about its long-awaited analysis of how climate change is affecting property insurance.

Instead, Heller, director of insurance at the Consumer Federation of America, got stonewalled.

“I don’t have anything definitive to report at this time,” replied Steven Seitz, director of the Treasury Department’s Federal Insurance Office, which launched the analysis that began in 2021.

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One day after Seitz’s terse answer at a Dec. 12 public meeting, leading consumer groups began pressuring the Biden administration to release its sweeping analysis of neighborhoods where property insurance is scarce or highly expensive.

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