"Amid tension over a looming government shutdown, minority leader Chuck Schumer heads an effort to tie presidential policies to lost jobs and soaring utility bills."
"With U.S. households paying 10 percent more per kilowatt hour for electricity than they did at the start of this year, Senate Democrats sought Monday to tie the increasing pain for consumers to the Trump administration’s relentless rollback of clean energy policy.
“Trump and Republicans are doing what the American people hate most, and that is raise costs,” said Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York in a conference call from Climate Week activities in his home state. “From skyrocketing electricity prices to ever-increasing homeowner insurance premiums because of climate change to healthcare.
“You may remember the biggest issue they had against Biden is raising costs,” Schumer said. “They’re making it much worse, and the American people are realizing it.”
Hawaii Sen. Brian Schatz, a leading Democrat on climate policy, said the increase in power prices—now occurring at twice the rate of inflation—can be traced to the administration’s decisions to stop clean energy projects and Congress’ repeal of federal support for renewable energy in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which it passed in July. Natural gas projects are backlogged because of supply chain issues and nuclear and geothermal power, which still get support under the new law, will take a long time to catch up with the increasing demand for electricity from data centers and artificial intelligence."
Marianne Lavelle reports for Inside Climate News September 22, 2025.
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