Users Currently Browsing This Topic:
0 Members

Author Topic: U.S. Politics  (Read 192233 times)

Offline Rick Plant

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 8177
Re: U.S. Politics
« Reply #1312 on: April 22, 2023, 06:53:51 AM »
Advertisement
GOP targets clean energy laws despite boons back home



Earlier this year, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene heralded the expansion of a South Korean solar panel production company in her district — a $2.5 billion cash infusion.

“QCells, the solar company … I think they’re fantastic,” she said. “I support all kinds of energy.”

It was made possible by the tax incentives included in President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act, which the Georgia Republican, along with all of her GOP colleagues, opposed.

Greene is far from alone among Republicans cheering clean energy investments created by Democratic policies they all snubbed. And that’s creating some awkward dynamics for GOP lawmakers who are seeking to wipe out Biden’s clean-energy spending plans as part of any deal to avert a U.S. debt default.

The White House, and supporters of Biden’s clean energy programs, are eagerly seizing on the contradiction.

“The Biden Clean Energy Plan has helped create more than 140,000 clean energy jobs across the U.S. — the majority of which are in Republican-held districts,” said Lori Lodes, executive director of the group Climate Power, citing its own estimates of the law’s economic impact.

“Now MAGA extremists are threatening to implode our country’s economy — and the clean energy manufacturing boom that’s happening in their communities — to protect their own corporate, anti-climate interests,” she said.

According to data provided by Climate Power, which was then reviewed, vetted and confirmed by POLITICO’s E&E News, at least 37 congressional districts now represented by Republicans have welcomed expansions of new clean energy operations fostered by three major Biden-era laws — last year’s Inflation Reduction Act, the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law or the CHIPS and Science Act.

A POLITICO analysis early this year similarly found that Republican districts were home to about two-thirds of the major renewable energy, battery and electric vehicle projects that companies had announced since Biden signed the IRA in August.

House Republicans all opposed the Inflation Reduction Act. All but 13 opposed the infrastructure law, and all but 34 voted against the CHIPS and Science Act.

Three House Republicans who are poised to see new chip manufacturing booms in their districts — Reps. Mike Simpson of Idaho, John Curtis of Utah and Richard Hudson of North Carolina, who chairs the National Republican Congressional Committee — were among those who scorned CHIPS.

In its reporting, E&E News found that 21 projects in Republican-led districts were a result of benefits from the IRA, while 15 were made possible by the infrastructure law. Some Republicans had multiple projects in their districts due to one or both of these laws.

Eleven Republicans responded to requests for comment or made themselves available for interviews to explain how they squared their opposition to these laws with their support for the jobs in their districts. They include Greene, who denied that any contradiction exists in her stance on Biden’s programs.

“I don’t think the government should be controlling our energy sector,” Greene said in an interview Thursday on Capitol Hill.

‘Height of hypocrisy’

Greene also insisted that the climate law’s enactment was not the catalyst for the expansion of QCells, despite the company’s statements asserting as much.

“Those jobs were jobs in my district under the Trump administration,” she said. “QCells … gave all the credit to the local counties there that helped them get started, and [Republican] Gov. [Brian] Kemp and the Trump administration.”

The company announced in January that it would add to existing facilities in Greene’s Dalton district, plus add a new facility in Cartersville, the district of Republican Rep. Barry Loudermilk. Qcells said at the time that the action “follow[ed] the passage of the Solar Energy Manufacturing in America Act within the Inflation Reduction Act.”

In April, Qcells further celebrated a deal that would require the Dalton plant to manufacture 2.5 million solar panels — the largest community solar order in American history — made possible by the 2022 climate spending law. Vice President Kamala Harris attended the festivities.

“It’s the height of hypocrisy for [Republicans] to be blasting the president and all he’s done to address climate change and build a clean energy economy that is directly benefiting people in their districts,” Craig Auster, vice president for political affairs at the League of Conservation Voters, said of the GOP lawmakers.

White House deputy press secretary Andrew Bates similarly scorned the GOP position in a memo Thursday that was later provided to news outlets including POLITICO’s E&E News. “Killing newly-created American manufacturing jobs just so the super wealthy and big corporations can enjoy tax welfare would be a gut-punch to America’s competitiveness and to thousands of working families in red states,” he wrote.

Republican districts benefit from Democratic, bipartisan laws

Projects in Republican districts are benefiting from spending approved in the Inflation Reduction Act, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, and the CHIPS and Science Act.Table showing which Republican law makers are using Inflation Reduction Act, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs act and the CHIPS and Science Act to benefit their districts

Rep. Dale Strong (R-Ala.) Nucor transmission tower production plant IRA and IIJA
Rep. Joe Wilson (R-S.C.) ABB EV chargers IRA and IIJA
Rep. Robert Aderholt (R-Ala.) First Solar factory IRA
Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) LG gigafactory IRA
Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) Longroad Energy solar storage project IRA
Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) Meyer Burger solar panel plant IRA
Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) Heritage Battery Recycling plant IRA
Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) CS Wind manufacturing expansion IRA
Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) General Electric nacelle manufacturing facility IRA
Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) Duke Energy solar project IRA
Rep. Drew Ferguson (R-Ga.) Freyr battery gigafactory IRA
Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) and Barry Loudermilk (R-Ga.)Qcells solar manufacturing IRA
Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks (R-Iowa) TPI Composites blade manufacturing plant IRA
Rep. Mary Miller (R-Ill.) WEC Energy solar plant IRA
Rep. Brett Guthrie (R-Ky.) Nucor steel mill IRA


In South Charleston, West Virginia, GreenPower Motor Co. has said its electric school bus facility benefited from the infrastructure law’s clean school bus program, and it has highlighted how its buses can also get tax credits worth up to $40,000 from the Inflation Reduction Act.

Republican Rep. Carol Miller, who represents that area, said in a statement that while “hardworking businesses like GreenPower Motor are responding to the rules set by the federal government to bring much needed investment to West Virginia … we should have provided them with the ability to grow without sending American tax dollars to the Chinese Communist Party.” (The administration insists its agenda is meant to provide jobs and economic security inside the U.S., not China.)

Miller added that “the jobs West Virginia is creating through the so-called ‘Inflation Reduction Act’ come nowhere close to replacing the opportunities that liberal activists destroyed in my state. The faster we can repeal these IRA tax credits and replace them with incentives that fully support American manufacturing and energy production, the better.”

Elsewhere in West Virginia, Sparkz Inc. — an energy startup producing lithium-ion batteries — is growing operations in Republican Rep. Alex Mooney’s district.

In March, Sparkz CEO Sanjiv Malhotra told an audience at the premier annual energy conference CERAWeek by S&P Global that he had Biden and Senate Energy and Natural Resources Chair Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) to thank for the Inflation Reduction Act, which led to the massive investment the company has made in the state.

Justifying the disconnect

Not every Republican had an explanation ready for how they squared their positions.

In Clarksville, Tenn., for instance, which is part of Rep. Mark Green’s district, Texas-based Microvast Holdings plans to expand an existing facility with a new plant for battery components. The Department of Energy picked the plant in October for a $200 million award under an infrastructure law program meant to boost battery materials processing and battery manufacturing.

GOP lawmakers are scrutinizing that award because of Microvast's significant presence and operations in China. DOE officials have said the money has not yet gone out while the agency continues to vet all of the award recipients.

Green said while he was concerned about the China connections, he didn’t feel prepared to talk about how the existence of the facility colors his view of the infrastructure law, which he voted against.

“I have to get some more information on it to answer the questions,” he said.

Others, however, sought to justify the disconnect.

Republican Rep. Mark Amodei of Nevada has two battery manufacturing facilities in his district that received incentives from the Inflation Reduction Act — Zinc8 Energy Solutions and Redwood Materials. The district is also home to a lithium manufacturing plant from Lilac Solutions because of the infrastructure law.

Despite all this activity, he said, “when you look at the overall policy, let’s just say for Nevada, these two pieces of funding do not make up for the damage these two pieces of legislation can do or are threatening to do.”

Rep. Chuck Fleischmann of Tennessee, the top Republican on the House Energy and Water Development Appropriations Subcommittee, was emphatic that a grant made possible by the infrastructure law for Novonix Ltd. to produce battery components in his district did not depend on protecting that piece of legislation in the long term.

In fact, he argued, the appropriations process has been filling the coffers of this project and others like it for some time now.

The infrastructure law and the Inflation Reduction Act “were like a false positive, if you will … the money’s there.”

Rep. Dan Newhouse, the chair of the Congressional Western Caucus, represents Moses Lake, Wash., where Sila Nanotechnologies received a $100 million award through an infrastructure law Energy Department program. Separately, REC Silicon, a solar-grade polysilicon manufacturer, said last year that the Inflation Reduction Act “underpinned” its decision to reopen its own closed plant in Moses Lake.

Concerns for projects despite 'no' votes

Some Republicans also laid bare how complicated the dynamics can be.

Just outside Charleston, S.C., in Rep. Nancy Mace’s district, the battery minerals recycling company Redwood Materials is working to build a $3.5 billion manufacturing campus.

“When paired with the benefits of the recent Inflation Reduction Act, this strategic location also allows us the opportunity to invest more heavily at home while potentially exporting components in the future, allowing the U.S. to become a global leader in this manufacturing capability,” the company said in announcing its plans.

J.B. Straubel, the company’s CEO, told The Wall Street Journal that the Inflation Reduction Act “has gently shifted our priorities to really accelerate investment in the U.S. a little bit ahead of looking overseas.”

Mace, in an interview, said the Redwood plant doesn’t change her opposition to the climate law: “It doesn’t do anything for inflation,” she said. “It was really just a gift to the Green New Deal.”

On the other hand, Mace is leaning against supporting House GOP leadership’s debt limit deal because of its rollbacks to the IRA’s clean energy provisions.

“I’m concerned about some of the things that’ll hurt some green energy like solar,” she said. “Solar is huge — not only in the Lowcountry, but across the entire state of South Carolina, it’s huge. This would adversely affect solar.”

Curtis, the chair of the Conservative Climate Caucus, has a semiconductor wafer plant from Texas Instruments booming in his Utah district thanks to an investment from the CHIPS and Science Act.

In a statement this week, he intimated that he would support the GOP debt limit bill but acknowledged it “also proposes cuts to clean energy tax credits” that he supported in previous legislative iterations before they were packaged in the partisan Inflation Reduction Act.

"I will continue to advocate for policies that lead to affordable, reliable, clean energy,” Curtis said.

'Candy apples' and 'toads'

Many of the GOP’s allies in the advocacy and industry community are likewise gritting their teeth at the party’s demands in the debt standoff.

“In the last nine months, the clean energy industry has announced 46 major manufacturing facilities and scores of clean energy projects in communities across the country,” said Jason Grumet, the CEO of the American Clean Power Association — the largest clean energy trade group — in a statement. “If enacted, [the GOP bill] would jeopardize these investments and thousands of good paying American jobs.”

But Heather Reams, president of the right-leaning Citizens for Responsible Energy Solutions, said in an interview Thursday that she couldn’t fault Republicans for rejecting the one-sided political process that surrounded the drafting, and enactment, of the Inflation Reduction Act.

“I don’t think you’re seeing Republicans turn their backs entirely as a party on clean energy; I think you’re seeing conservatives turning their backs on out-of-control spending, and the IRA being ground zero for partisan spending,” she said.

Luke Bolar, who leads external relations and communications at the conservative clean energy group ClearPath, dwelled on Republicans’ complicated relationship with the IRA’s clean energy tax credits during a keynote speech in March at the Conservative Climate Leadership Conference.

urged citizen lobbyists to press for implementation of elements of the climate law, but conceded: “That’s a tricky one, right? Zero Republicans supported that. … However, some of the tax incentives that were included in the IRA had tremendous Republican support.”

Bolar mentioned the law’s incentives for carbon capture and sequestration, which can offer fossil fuel companies payments for corralling greenhouse gases.

Rep. Morgan Griffith (R-Va.) put the GOP’s green jobs predicament more colorfully.

“I always refer to pieces of legislation as having either candy apples or toads,” Griffith observed. “If there's enough candy apples, you can swallow a toad or two. Some of the renewable or biofuels tax credits, those are the toads you may have to swallow in order to set the stage and have some candy apples and try to rein in some of this government spending.”

https://www.eenews.net/articles/gop-targets-clean-energy-laws-despite-boons-back-home/

JFK Assassination Forum

Re: U.S. Politics
« Reply #1312 on: April 22, 2023, 06:53:51 AM »


Online Richard Smith

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 5378
Re: U.S. Politics
« Reply #1313 on: April 22, 2023, 05:43:06 PM »
Brutal honesty from the Wall Street Journal editorial board:

"The public understands what Mr. Biden apparently won’t admit: that electing an octogenarian in obvious decline for another four years could be an historic mistake."

Offline Rick Plant

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 8177
Re: U.S. Politics
« Reply #1314 on: April 22, 2023, 10:24:38 PM »
The overwhelming majority of Americans oppose this disastrous Republican plan which will destroy American jobs, cut benefits from our Veterans, and make severe cuts to Social Security. 4 years of Donald Trump ballooned our deficit and right wing Republicans refuse to pay their debt.


VA warns 81K health care employees’ jobs at risk under House GOP debt ceiling plan

Federal agencies are warning that a deal by House Republicans to raise the debt ceiling in exchange for significant budget cuts would eliminate the jobs of tens of thousands of federal employees.

The Department of Veterans Affairs announced Friday that a plan led by House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) to cut nondefense federal spending would result in the loss of 81,000 jobs across the Veterans Health Administration.

The VA estimates such a major reduction of its health care workforce would mean 30 million fewer patient visits per year, and would limit veterans’ access to cancer screenings, mental health services and substance addiction treatment.

The Office of Management and Budget estimated Thursday that McCarthy’s proposal would result in a 22% cut to nondefense discretionary spending.

McCarthy’s bill, the Limit, Save, Grow Act, would bring fiscal 2024 discretionary spending back down to 2022 levels, but would exempt defense spending. The bill would limit federal spending to 1% growth a year for a decade. House Republican leadership released the bill on Wednesday.

The bill would raise the debt ceiling by $1.5 billion, or until the end of March 2024 — whichever happens first.

“This bill is vague by design — but that doesn’t obscure the fact that it will force devastating cuts that will hurt millions of people, damage our economy, and undermine our national security,” OMB Director Shalanda Young wrote in a blog post on Thursday.

The VA estimates it also would need to eliminate more than 6,000 staff at the Veterans Benefits Administration.

Those cuts would increase the disability claims backlog by an estimated 134,000 claims, “forcing veterans and their surviving loved ones to wait longer for the benefits they have earned.”

The VA would make these severe workforce cuts at a time when it’s ramping up hiring to handle a growing workload under the PACT Act, which is meant to expand VA care and benefits for veterans exposed to toxic burn pits during their military service.

The VA said budget cuts would also force the National Cemetery Administration (NCA) to eliminate approximately 500 staff, and would delay the opening of five new national cemeteries.

The VA stands out as the agency that would see the biggest potential loss of federal employees under the spending plan, but other agencies have also stated they would be forced to cut staff under the plan.

McCarthy, in a speech at the New York Stock on Monday, said the proposal would not result in “draconian limits,” and that lawmakers under the spending plan “make sure that our veterans and our service members are taken care of.”

“The bloated, overgrown bureaucracy that has expanded under President Biden needs to be pruned, and that’s exactly what we’ll do. If Washington wants to spend more, it will have to come together to find savings elsewhere — just like every household in America does,” McCarthy said.

The spending plan would also rescind unspent COVID-19 relief spending. It would also roll back all unspent IRS funds received in the Inflation Reduction Act to rebuild its workforce and upgrade its legacy IT systems.

The IRS, using about 1% of the nearly $80 billion received in the Inflation Reduction Act, went from answering 15% of calls in 2022 to answering 87% of calls this year.

“If we’re funded at a steady level or cut, then all we can do is maintain our current operations,” IRS Commissioner Danny Werfel said told the Senate Finance Committee on Wednesday.

“We have to make investments to deal with this complexity of what we see today.”

Julie Tippens, legislative director at the American Federation of Government Employees, wrote in a letter to lawmakers that federal deficits are “not the result of growth in federal agencies or employment,” adding federal civilian employment remains less than it was in the 1960s.

“Federal workers have continued to maintain public safety and provide public service throughout the pandemic, even as their wages have lagged behind inflation and continued to trail the private sector,” Tippens said.

AFGE said other agencies have informed the House Appropriations Committee that they would also force to make significant cuts to their workforce under the House Republicans’ spending plan.

The Social Security Administration said it would need to close field offices, reduce hours and increase wait times by up to 30%.

The Department of Homeland Security would have to reduce hours of service at sea and land ports of entry, and that those cuts would result in “likely increasing the amount of fentanyl entering the country.”

The Transportation Security Administration would also be forced to furlough frontline staff, resulting in airport wait times going up “in excess of two hours.” AFGE also warns the budget cuts would also roll back the agency’s recent efforts to improve TSA staffing, pay and retention.

The Agriculture Department warns it could see a $250 million cut to its Food Safety and Inspection Service, and that cuts to its workforce of inspectors could lead to delays and higher food production costs.

The Transportation Department warns that proposed cuts would force the Federal Railroad Administration to announce a Reduction In Force, and layoff 175 personnel, including 75 safety inspectors.

White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters Thursday that President Joe Biden has not yet scheduled a meeting with McCarthy over debt ceiling negotiations.

The Treasury Department estimates the federal government would reach the current debt limit by early June.

If the debt limit is reached, Treasury is prepared to take several “extraordinary measures,” such as temporarily suspending new contributions in the Civil Service Retirement and Disability Fund, as well as the Postal Service Retiree Health Benefits Fund.

Treasury is also prepared to temporarily suspend contributions to the Thrift Saving Plan’s G Fund.

https://federalnewsnetwork.com/workforce/2023/04/va-warns-81k-health-care-employees-jobs-at-risk-under-house-gop-debt-ceiling-plan/

JFK Assassination Forum

Re: U.S. Politics
« Reply #1314 on: April 22, 2023, 10:24:38 PM »


Offline Rick Plant

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 8177
Re: U.S. Politics
« Reply #1315 on: April 22, 2023, 10:46:19 PM »
Marjorie Taylor Greene silenced by committee after calling DHS Secretary Mayorkas 'a liar'
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2023/04/19/marjorie-taylor-greene-mayorkas-liar/11697474002/


'That's not America': Retired military officer compares Florida's 'religious fascism' to 9/11

A retired U.S. Navy officer has declared war on the "religious fanatics" in Florida who are flooding school boards with demands to ban books, arguing in front of one board that they are engaging in "religious fascism."

According to a report from the Daily Beast's Michael Daly, 54-year-old Wess Rexrode appeared at a school board hearing in Florida's Martin County where he gave members of the board and supporters of book bans a piece of his mind.

Rexrode, who was deployed on the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt on 9/11, bluntly stated, "Religious fanatics, who wouldn’t even let women be educated, flew planes into the World Trade Center and my Pentagon. I spent the last decade of my naval career fighting religious fascism abroad. I never thought I’d have to fight it right here in the United States of America.”

According to the Beast's Daly, "Rexrode was speaking specifically of those who used a new Florida law to have 92 books banned from the county’s public school classrooms and libraries. Books by Jodi Picoult and Toni Morrison were removed following an objection filed by a member of Moms for Liberty who had not even read them."

Rexrode explained that he has a 14-year-old in middle school, before stating, “I don’t need anyone else telling my son what he can and cannot read. I’m perfectly capable of doing that myself.”

“I grew up in rural South Carolina, and books got me out of the trailer parks,”he continued. “My parents trusted those educators and the librarians to let me read what I needed to read.”

“I want my son exposed to different ideas and different viewpoints so that he can learn to think critically and not be force fed somebody else’s opinion. We’ve all been exposed to different opinions. It makes us better, makes us stronger,” he continued. "Diversity has made me stronger. And I didn’t sacrifice 21 years of my life to stand idly by while religious fanatics and other fanatics try to impose fascism on my country.”

In an interview with the Beast, he admitted, "I’m not right or left. I think for myself, and my oath was to the Constitution, not a political party. I just want what’s best for America.”

“I think my patriotism and my intelligence and my work ethic and my bonafides, I guess sort of speak to themselves. So then people typically have to debate me on the facts, instead of attacking me personally, which too many times a lot of debate these days devolves into," he added.

Read More Here: https://www.thedailybeast.com/retired-navy-officer-takes-on-floridas-book-ban-fascism

Online Richard Smith

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 5378
Re: U.S. Politics
« Reply #1316 on: April 23, 2023, 02:55:22 PM »
Brutal negative poll numbers for Ukraine Joe as he prepares to announce another run.  74% of Americans believe the country is going in the wrong direction and even a majority of Dems don't want him to run!  Unreal.  Even Nixon during Watergate had more support from his own party.  He would be 86 at the end of his next term!  Unreal. 

JFK Assassination Forum

Re: U.S. Politics
« Reply #1316 on: April 23, 2023, 02:55:22 PM »


Offline Rick Plant

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 8177
Re: U.S. Politics
« Reply #1317 on: April 23, 2023, 10:45:02 PM »
President Biden Meets with President Michael Higgins of Ireland

President Biden Meets with President Michael Higgins of Ireland and Participates in a Tree Planting Ceremony and Ringing of the Peace Bell.

Dublin, Ireland

Watch:


Offline Rick Plant

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 8177
Re: U.S. Politics
« Reply #1318 on: April 23, 2023, 10:46:34 PM »
President Biden Delivers Remarks on Building Healthy Communities and Advance Environmental Justice

Watch:


Offline Rick Plant

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 8177
Re: U.S. Politics
« Reply #1319 on: April 23, 2023, 10:49:20 PM »
President Biden Delivers Remarks at the 2023 Major Economies Forum on Energy and Climate

President Biden convenes the fourth virtual leader-level meeting of the Major Economies Forum (MEF) on Energy and Climate.

Watch:


JFK Assassination Forum

Re: U.S. Politics
« Reply #1319 on: April 23, 2023, 10:49:20 PM »