Dems Fuming Over Collapse of Energy Talks, Blame Speaker Johnson

As part of this ridiculous spending bill that is working its way through Congress, the buildout of energy projects was going to be attached.

Speaker Johnson, however, appears to have shut that down, and the decision is not sitting well with Senator Joe Manchin (I-W.V.) and Senator Tom Carper (D-DE).

The Energy Buildout

When it comes to energy, the Dems and GOP are on completely different sides of the coin.

Big oil generally backs the GOP, and renewable energy generally backs Democrats, so both sides are trying to ruin the other.

I have long stated that we should not be put in an either-or scenario, as these two sectors can complement each other to provide the cheapest possible solutions for the American consumer.

Senator Manchin, who is retiring from the Senate, was looking for his piece of legacy legislation on this front, and he thought this would be it, but Johnson is blocking it, and Manchin is fuming. He stated, “It’s a shame that our country is losing this monumental opportunity to advance the commonsense, bipartisan permitting reform bill that has strong support in the United States Senate.”

Johnson Steps In

This legislation has been in the works for nearly two years, so I get Machin’s frustration, but I also understand Johnson’s point about waiting until the last possible second to attach this to a massive omnibus spending bill.

To that point, Johnson’s office stated, “Senate Democrats had several opportunities during both this Congress and the previous one to achieve meaningful permitting reform and failed. If they were truly committed to reaching an agreement, negotiations would have started months ago – not after they lost the election.

“With a Republican White House, Senate and House, we are confident we will secure stronger and more comprehensive permitting reforms in the next Congress.”

Rep. Westerman (R-AR) has been negotiating on behalf of the House on this, seemed optimistic that something will get on paper soon, stating, “We made progress and are still at the table working in good faith. We must get this right and are still working on a handful of issues that could unlock a deal.”

Reality Strikes

In reality, the reason that Manchin and company wanted this attached to the omnibus spending bill is because reconciliation can be used to ram that through if need be, and it would likely have been needed for this bill if Manchin could not get 10 Republican Senators to back his legislation.

This is also why Johnson pushed back on the legislation, and his point is valid that Dems had more than enough time to work on this legislation.

I am not the biggest fan of Johnson, but I completely understand backing off this legislation to allow Trump and Republicans to craft their own legislation rather than having to live with something Democrats rammed through in the last days of the Biden administration.

My last point… omnibus legislation must be stopped. The current bill is more than 1,000 pages long and by the time members vote on it, they have very little time to digest it before the vote is held. I guarantee you that if this passes, there are things in there we won’t even learn about until next year. So, if it passes and Republicans complain about it next year, just check to see who votes in favor of the legislation.