Van Jones, praised by a group of young liberals in Washington on Wednesday night, says there’s no bad blood between him and President Obama — or even the conservative radio talk show host whose protests contributed to his leaving his White House job.
“You know, when you get in your car, the windshield is a lot bigger than the rear-view window,” said Jones, asked by The Daily Caller if he harbors animosity against Obama or Fox News’ Glenn Beck. “So you know, I’m focused on what’s good for the country.”
Jones served as President Obama’s “green jobs czar” in the White House until he was forced to resign after it was revealed he signed a petition questioning whether the government was behind the September 11, 2001 attacks.
He was honored Wednesday by the New Leaders Council, a gathering of self-proclaimed progressive young professionals, as a pioneer for “his work in furthering the environmental movement.” Since leaving the White House, Jones has since joined the liberal think tank Center for American Progress and will teach at Princeton starting this summer.
Jones resigned Sept. 5 after a large concentration of conservatives, including Beck, became outraged over his past activities, such as signing the 911truth.org “truther” petition. Video also surfaced of him using vulgar language about Republicans, calling them “assholes.” He apologized for both before his resignation from the White House.
“What we all got to stay focused on are the solutions that will actually make a difference for ordinary people, and not get pulled into the political theater after these things because that doesn’t really help anybody,” he said.
About 100 young people gathered on a Washington rooftop to give Jones an award as the sun set Wednesday night. Attendees sipped cocktails and listened to Jones speak about “going from hope to change.”
During his brief remarks and question session, he only briefly touched on his tenure at the White House, making passing jokes about it. “People say, ‘Oh Van, it’s terrible. You were in the White House and then … I’m sorry!’”
“So was I,” he said to a burst of laughter. “That was not fun!”
Jones touched on a number of environmental issues, eliciting laughter by saying cap-and-trade sounds like the Captain Crunch cereal. He said that while people can be fined for throwing gum on the cement, big companies don’t have to worry about being fined for pollution under current law. “Our energy company should follow the same rules that you do,” he said.
“If you got a $25 fine for littering, you’d be paying $25 more than any big polluter that has ever been forced to pay for dumping megatons of carbon — the most dangerous pollution we know — day after day, year after year.”
During an interview with The Daily Caller afterward, Jones declined to comment on whether he thinks the president will be able to get a climate and energy bill passed.