Ranking Member DeLauro Floor Remarks on Republicans’ 2025 Energy and Water Development Funding Bill

Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro (D-CT-03), Ranking Member of the House Appropriations Committee, delivered the following remarks on the House Floor in opposition to the 2025 Energy and Water Development and Related Agencies funding bill:

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

And my thanks go to Chairman Fleischmann and Ranking Member Kaptur, and to the Energy and Water subcommittee staff for your hard work on this bill, especially Scott McKee and Adam Wilson.

With this bill, we have a rare opportunity to make strategic investments that lower energy costs for American families, promote America’s energy independence, and support a robust and modern manufacturing sector.

This is a real chance to ensure America’s resiliency in the face of a changing climate and shifting global economy. But that is not what the majority has chosen.

Instead, the majority has cut domestic investments in this bill by over 5 percent, and with it, they are increasing energy costs, jeopardizing our energy independence and national security, hurting our global competitiveness, failing to confront the climate crisis, and putting tens of thousands of good-paying manufacturing jobs at risk.

Even if some members of this body may choose to refuse the overwhelming evidence, deny the scientific consensus, and ignore the worsening natural disasters that have become more severe and more common in each of our districts, we must aggressively transform our energy sector to adapt to our climate reality.

The best path – and the only path – that addresses climate change, reduces our dependence on fossil fuels, and ends reliance on foreign energy is to diversify how we produce and store energy at home.

But, instead of ensuring America leads the world in the development and transition to a global clean energy economy, the majority’s bill strips $1.5 billion from the Department of Energy for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.

Project 2025 is a Trump MAGA Republican agenda to take over the government and our rights and freedoms.

When it comes to green and renewable energy, Project 2025 spells out how Republicans would end any investments altogether – Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy included.

It is in the document, and it is in reality in the appropriations bill.

Project 2025 says we must end the focus on climate change and green subsidies, we must eliminate appliance energy efficiency standards, and that Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy should be entirely eliminated. They are going down the road of eliminating it.

This goes beyond climate denial. This is climate capitulation. This is climate arson. This is damning our children to an extreme and dangerous future.

We recently received a letter from the Natural Resources Defense Council and dozens of other organizations highlighting how a cut to this program is fiscally irresponsible and threatens our energy future.

They said, and I quote, “The House proposal for [Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy] significantly threatens energy innovation in the United States. Not only would its proposed cuts hamper innovation within the United States, but they also would hinder a program that has provided significant return on investment for taxpayers. Several independent impact evaluation studies have assessed one-third of [Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy’s] research and development portfolio to date and have found that $12 billion in total investment has generated more than $388 billion in net economic benefits to the United States.” End quote. At the appropriate time, I will submit this letter into the Congressional Record.

This funding supports research and development, manufacturing, energy management, and weatherization technologies that are critical to our nation’s growth and resilience. These cuts are robbing from our children’s and grandchildren’s economic, energy, and environmental future.

The bill directly targets disadvantaged communities by slashing funding for the Weatherization Assistance Program, which will drive up the cost of home energy bills for roughly 54,000 low-income homes.

The attack on our country’s energy future does not stop there. The majority’s bill hurts our global competitiveness and eliminates good-paying manufacturing jobs by revoking $8 billion from the Department of Energy’s Loan Programs.

These programs promote innovation and manufacturing in America, creating and reshoring jobs that will help America become truly energy independent, and a leader in green energy. But without this funding, thousands of manufacturing jobs are at risk, and we will fall further behind our global competitors.

This bill fails to create a sustainable future, and it fails to ensure Americans have equitable access to resilient, secure, and clean energy sources.

Democrats are ready to pass legislation that lowers energy costs for the American people and ensures America leads the global transition to a clean energy economy.

I implore the majority to join us. It is time to govern.

Thank you, and I yield back.

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