Democrats won Congress on a promise to make life cheaper, and power bills are on the list. When they take control in January, they say they will push clean energy to bring those bills down and investigate the Trump administration’s cancellation of clean-energy grants. The households with the most to gain are Black ones.
A 2020 study by the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy, using 2017 Census Bureau housing data, found that Black households spend 43% more of their income on energy than white households. The median burden was 4.1% of income for Black households and 2.8% for white ones. The data is from 2017, and no newer national study of the gap is cited in the coverage of this plan.
The plan, as the Associated Press and The Energy Mix report it, has several parts. More than 160 House Democrats have signed on to the Energy Bills Relief Act. Democrats also want hearings on the elimination of green-energy grants, a push to restore renewable energy incentives, and faster approval of new clean-energy projects.
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, the top Democrat on the Environment and Public Works Committee, blamed the administration’s attacks on clean energy for higher prices. He said Democrats will “work every angle to lower consumers’ energy costs, and we will demand accountability for the massive corruption wrought by Trump’s fossil-fuel donors.”
Rep. Sean Casten of Illinois, a Democrat, was more candid about the limits. Democrats do not have enough votes to override a veto, so he said they will lean on “appropriations and in oversight” rather than sweeping new law. Trump said after the election that Democrats will send over “things that are insane” and that he will veto them.
There is a fair objection, and it comes from the AP’s own reporting: what people pay for electricity depends on fuel costs, demand and the upkeep of the grid, not only on federal policy. A bill can restore a tax credit and still leave a family’s meter running high. Climate was not a central issue in the campaign, either. Party leaders such as Rep. Frank Pallone, who is expected to chair the House Energy and Commerce Committee, put health care and affordability first.
That is the reason the plan should be judged by who it reaches. A tax credit for rooftop solar does little for a renter on a fixed income. Weatherization money, which seals the houses that waste the most power, does. If Democrats want the credit they claim for lower bills, the test is whether the money lands in the neighborhoods where the burden is heaviest, and whether they spend their January fights on it rather than on messaging bills built for a veto.
Democrats also now hold the governor’s offices in Texas and Georgia, which analysts told the AP could open the way to “significant state action on climate.” Congress returns in January.
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