Ranking Member DeLauro Statement at the Subcommittee Markup of the 2025 Energy and Water Development Funding Bill

Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro (D-CT-03), Ranking Member of the House Appropriations Committee, delivered the following remarks at the subcommittee markup of the 2025 Energy and Water Development funding bill:

Thank you, Chairman Fleischmann and Ranking Member Kaptur, and my thanks to the subcommittee staff for your work on this bill, especially Scott McKee, Jocelyn Hunn, and Adam Wilson.

We have a rare opportunity in this subcommittee to make strategic investments that lower energy costs for American families, that promote America’s energy independence, and to 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 though some of our colleagues on the other side of the aisle may want 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 – 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.

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. It will leave them with a more dangerous world than the one we inherited.

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.

I am disheartened that the majority’s Energy and Water bill has taken such a strong anti-sustainability stance.

Sustainability is a straight-forward demand that we responsibly steward the planet and its natural resources for future generations. This bill fails that demand. It fails to create a sustainable future, and it fails to ensure all consumers have equitable access to resilient, secure, and clean energy.

At this final subcommittee markup of the year, I want to make sure that everybody knows what we have seen to date: the House Republican majority has consistently failed to write bills that adhere to their promise of sticking to the caps with nothing more.

However, despite opening the door to additional resources, House Republicans’ proposals still fall woefully short. Their bills would still cut nondefense investments by more than $52 billion from where we were with the final bills in March, leaving more than $60 billion in investments in American families on the table.

Let me be perfectly clear: House Republicans have acknowledged in their own bills that the statutory caps are insufficient. That is something I whole-heartedly agree with.

So, I say to my colleagues what I have said time and time again: We know where we need to go. House Democrats are ready to work together, but we will accept nothing less than a one percent increase in defense and nondefense funding. That means a starting point of $786 billion in nondefense resources.

To those who believe we need more on the defense side – like the esteemed chair of the Defense subcommittee testified at Rules earlier this week – I will say again: Democrats will demand that every additional dollar for defense will be matched by a dollar for critical nondefense investments in American families.

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

I implore the majority to join us. It is time to govern. Thank you, and I yield back.

###