Democrats eye changes to climate spending clawbacks
'Clearly, their idea of a good day is to get up in the morning and try to roll back the opportunity for some clean energy,' said Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), ranking member on the Finance Committee. 'I think they're going to find that what they really get out of it is higher prices, because they're reducing choices and competition in private markets.'
The Senate advanced the rescissions bill on two procedural motions Tuesday night — with Vice President JD Vance breaking 50-50 ties both times — and will kick off a marathon series of amendment votes as soon as Wednesday. It's not yet clear which, or how many, amendments could get votes.
Senate Appropriations Chair Susan Collins (R-Maine) and fellow appropriators Sens. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) voted against moving forward.
Collins said in a statement, 'The sparse text that was sent to Congress included very little detail and does not give an accounting of the specific program cuts that would total $9.4 billion. For example, there are $2.5 billion in cuts to the Development Assistance account, which covers everything from basic education, to water and sanitation, to food security – but we don't know how those programs will be affected.'
Republican leaders are hoping to pass the package and send it back to the House, where a previous version passed last month, for a final vote before the weekend.
The legislation needs only a simple majority to pass, and it must get the president's signature by midnight Friday in order to rescind the funds in question.
The legislation, championed by Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought, would target the United States' fiscal 2025 contributions to multilateral environmental efforts such as the Montreal Protocol and the Clean Technology Fund.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Boston Globe
8 minutes ago
- Boston Globe
'Relieved': Educators await Trump administration to release $6 billion in frozen funding
Advertisement The Trump administration announced the funding freeze on June 30, a day before the money was supposed to be sent to school districts in both New England and across the nation. It was another move toward the White House's goal to dismantle the Education Department, as President Trump argues that classrooms are teaching left-wing ideology. In Massachusetts, the freeze translated into $108 million withheld, leaving many districts scrambling to ensure they could still provide services during the summer months and the upcoming fall semester, with some cancelling summer programs entirely. In addition to training educators Advertisement Ray Hart, executive director of the Council of the Great City Schools, a nationwide association of urban districts that includes Boston, said in a statement they're 'relieved' about the administration releasing the funds 'for the benefit of schoolchildren throughout our nation.' In Rhode Island, education commissioner Angélica Infante-Green said, 'On behalf of Rhode Island's students, families, and teachers,' it is 'relieved to hear that the congressionally approved education funding is set to be released.' The Education Department 'will begin dispersing funds to states next week,' said Madi Biedermann, a spokesperson for the department, in a statement Friday. Biedermann said the Office of Management and Budget completed its review of the grants and directed the Education Department to release the funding. The move comes after the District of Columbia and 24 states, including Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Maine, 'It is impossible for states to effectively budget for an upcoming school year ... when the president takes the football away from us, like Lucy in a Charlie Brown cartoon,' said Peter Neronha, Rhode Island Attorney General, at a press conference announcing the lawsuit earlier this month. Related : A coalition of school districts and teachers' unions, including the Rhode Island Federation of Teachers and Health Professionals, Susan Collins, a Republican senator from Maine, and Ed Markey, a Democratic senator from Massachusetts, were among the politicians who criticized the freeze and demanded the administration release the money. Advertisement 'Every day that goes by without this education funding hurts our students, educators, and communities,' said Pedro Martinez, Commissioner of the Massachusetts Department for Elementary and Secondary Education, in a statement Thursday. 'We are still recovering from pandemic learning loss, and these federal funds are directly related to improving student academic achievement.' In early July, Governor Maura Healey said in a statement that districts would be forced to lay off staff, delay or cancel programs, and disrupt learning. 'Our schools were promised this funding, and the Trump Administration needs to deliver it,' Healey said. In a survey by the School Superintendents Association, about three-quarters said they would cut academic programs, and half said they would lay off teachers if funding was not restored. In a statement, the executive director of the association, David Schuler, said he was 'pleased' with the news of the funding being released. Some programs saw an immediate, negative impact following the freeze, including the The program, which has operated in Massachusetts since 1966, aims to address the toll on children's education caused by the frequent moves, as students transfer between different school districts or miss school altogether to work alongside their parents. In Springfield, 9-year-old Ery Perez Gutierrez last summer focused on sharpening his academic skills at Advertisement Ery is among hundreds of children in Massachusetts spending the summer at home because of the funding freeze. President Trump had proposed cutting the Migrant Education Program altogether in the next Last year, the grant served 438 students for summer programs statewide, said Emily Hoffman, director of the program in Massachusetts. The loss of the program at Boland Elementary is 'heartbreaking' and a 'huge step backwards,' as students are going without much-needed services, said Lisa Bakowski, the school's principal, who oversaw the program for the past three summers. Bakowski said the children enrolled in the program are among the most vulnerable in the community. Their parents work in the fields all day and often don't speak English. 'It sickens me that it's become a political issue when it really should never have been,' Bakowski said. 'It's about the betterment of humanity and being able to work to assist and provide for pockets of our community that need it.' Related : Other programs targeted in the freeze weren't immediately impacted. The largest grant frozen, known as Advertisement In previous years, Boston Public Schools used the funding to provide additional support for the district's recruitment efforts and educator preparation, including through an intensive 12-month program that prepares aspiring teachers to enter the classroom at no cost to them. Following the freeze announcement, BPS 'identified temporary one-time funding to maintain these efforts, which will continue in Fiscal Year 2026 despite the funding freeze with the hopes that the funding will eventually be available,' a spokesperson said in a statement Thursday. Massachusetts districts received $27 million in fiscal year 2025 for teacher training, with BPS receiving about Marcela Rodrigues can be reached at
Fox News
9 minutes ago
- Fox News
Rep Nancy Mace says a decision on potential gubernatorial campaign will be made in next couple of days
Rep. Nancy Mace, R-S.C., said she will decide whether to run for governor of South Carolina in the coming days on 'Fox Report.'
Yahoo
37 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Trump fired him over white supremacist links. Now he's leading the US Institute of Peace
Darren Beattie, a top State Department official who was fired from the first Trump administration after speaking at a conference attended by white supremacists, has been appointed to lead the U.S. Institute for Peace, an independent nonprofit funded by Congress. Beattie, who will continue serving as U.S. Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy while leading the institute as acting president, has a history of inflammatory views. The former academic has lauded eugenics-style population control and mass sterilization, praised the Chinese Communist party and dismissed its repressive campaign against the Uyghurs, claimed the January 6 insurrection at the Capitol was a conspiracy by federal agents, and wrote on social media last year that 'competent white men must be in charge if you want things to work.' 'We look forward to seeing him advance President Trump's America First agenda in this new role,' the State Department said in a statement on Friday. The Trump administration has tried to exert control over the peace-keeping organization as part of the president's radical restructuring of federal agencies and diplomacy. In February, the president signed an executive order slashing most of the group's staff, part of a wider effort to drastically change U.S. tools of foreign influence and diplomacy that also saw the administration gut the U.S. Agency for International Development. The following month, Elon Musk's so-called DOGE initiative seized the peace institute's headquarters with the help of police and the FBI, ejecting staff from the building. Staff members then sued over the takeover and mass firings, and a federal judge in May temporarily blocked the Trump administration from dismantling the institute. The administration then appealed, and a federal appeals court in Washington last month returned control of the building to the administration as the legal process plays out. In March, Democratic members of Congress wrote to Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who sits on the board of the U.S. Institute for Peace, expressing alarm over Beattie's appointment in February to his diplomatic post. 'Darren Beattie's white nationalist loyalties and public glorification of our adversaries' authoritarian systems make him unqualified to serve as the top diplomat representing American values and culture to foreign audiences,' the members wrote. The Independent has requested comment from the State Department and U.S. Institute for Peace for comment. After his dismissal from the Trump administration in 2018, Beattie returned to the government two years later, with the White House appointing him to the Commission for the Preservation of American Heritage Abroad, a body that preserves historical sites, including those related to the Holocaust. The Biden administration forced Beattie's resignation from the commission in 2022. Beattie isn't the only Trump staffer welcomed back into the government after controversy over their views. Marko Elez, a DOGE staffer who previously praised eugenics, declared himself 'racist before it was cool,' and said he wanted to 'normalize Indian hate,' according to reporting from The Wall Street Journal, resigned from the administration in February, but soon found a new position in the Social Security Administration.
