Less than two weeks after sweeping wins in the House and Senate, Democrats already face an early test of how they’ll approach their affordability agenda — a debate that’s prompting fundamental questions about how and when to compromise with Republicans.
The internal dispute isn’t about high-profile fights over the Iran war or health care. Instead, it’s a little-known battle over permitting for energy and infrastructure projects that has confronted Democrats with a hard choice.
A bipartisan bill moving through the Senate would overhaul the environmental review process, speeding up permitting and expanding electricity transmission. Supporters say the legislation would lower energy costs by paving the way for more generation and transmission of electricity.
But progressives and some other Democrats say it was negotiated from a place of weakness, before Democrats won roughly 260 House seats and as many as 56 Senate seats. They’d like fewer concessions to oil and gas interests, more input from tribal governments and more protection of historic sites.
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., one of the negotiators of the bipartisan bill, told MS NOW the fight boils down to the fundamental question of accepting a good deal.
“There’s a famous saying about the bird in the hand,” Whitehouse said Tuesday. “Particularly when we have big Democratic majorities to address things that people are concerned about. Don’t let the bird in the hand get away — it’s too big.”
The bill’s critics counter that Democrats will have more leverage to negotiate a better deal come January.
“The reason you hold out for more leverage is because there are a lot of flaws in this bill that need to be fixed,” Rep. Jared Huffman, D-Calif., ranking member of the House Natural Resources Committee, told MS NOW on Wednesday. “If the proponents of it can fix them in this Congress, I’m all for it. But I definitely know that the next Congress will.”
Huffman said the fight is also a chance for progressives to remind party leaders not to give up their leverage, though he said he trusts House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y.
“I think our leadership on the House side understands that,” Huffman said. “I do have questions about the Senate side.”
The fight has so far divided Senate Democrats almost evenly. Senators voted 73-25 on an initial procedural vote, clearing a key hurdle, with 22 Democrats supporting the measure and 24 opposing it.
A vote on passage in the Senate could come next week, though critics have pushed for amendment votes and leaders may face an uphill battle to get unanimous consent to speed up the bill’s consideration.
Senate passage would send the measure back to the House, where the fault lines roughly run along the moderate-to-progressive divide.
The Congressional Progressive Caucus opposes the measure, saying it rolls back environmental protections. The center-left New Democrat Coalition supports the bill, arguing that it responds to voter demands to address the cost of living by lowering electricity costs.
Rep. Brad Schneider, D-Ill., chairman of the New Democrat Coalition, echoed Whitehouse’s plea for Democrats to accept an incremental victory.
“Politics is the art of the possible, and we’re always balancing,” Schneider told MS NOW on Wednesday. “I think you move forward, lock in what progress is made, and keep working to make more progress tomorrow.”
The permitting bill would limit the number of projects subject to reviews under the National Environmental Policy Act, speeding up the process and reducing a key tool environmentalists have used to block projects they oppose. But supporters say it would also clear the way for more clean energy.
That dynamic has made for tough choices for Democrats, Sen. Martin Heinrich, D-N.M., told reporters on Monday.
“Leadership is hardest when you disagree with your friends, and I think there has been a reliance on litigation to stop bad projects,” Heinrich, ranking member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources, said. “But that reliance has also created a permitting structure where today, even for really good projects, they still get litigated, and so power lines take 15 to 20 years to build.”
A study released in October by the nonprofit Resources for the Future estimated that the bill would boost electricity transmission by 30% by 2041, cut the cost of providing electricity by 3.5-7% on average during that time, and reduce carbon emissions by clearing the way for new clean-energy projects to displace older power plants.
The wonky nature of the 494-page bill has only increased the amount of resistance from Democratic lawmakers, who have no shortage of provisions to criticize. Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., opposed the initial procedural vote on the measure, siding with groups including the National Trust for Historic Preservation, which have said the bill doesn’t do enough to protect historic sites.
Kaine told MS NOW on Tuesday he’s not opposed to the bill outright. He could still support the measure, he said, if lawmakers adopt an amendment removing provisions that undermine the review process for protecting historic sites.
“There’s some things I like a lot, some things I don’t, but that I can see myself voting for because of the things I like a lot,” Kaine said. “It’s just that historic preservation title, because there’s so many historically sensitive sites and resources in Virginia. That’s the one — I don’t think that needed to be in the bill.”
Other opponents also insist they’re focused on substance and not the politics of leverage.
“The problem with the permitting bill is it turns on the faucet for renewable electrons a little bit but it opens the faucet wide open on carbon electrons accentuating the damage from climate change,” Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., told MS NOW on Tuesday. “That’s a very specific problem.”
President Donald Trump’s unpredictability has further complicated Democratic calculations. Trump, who supports the bill, threw a wrench into negotiations when he told reporters on Monday he wouldn’t approve permits for wind power projects under the law.
Huffman seized on the comments, comparing it to Trump’s waiver of Russia sanctions, in a post on X.
“Dem Senators: How gullible are you? Trump is about to punk you just like he did with the ‘Russia sanctions bill’ where you gave him new tariff authority. Please wake up,” Huffman wrote.
Trump’s comments have also weighed on some Democrats who were on the fence about the bill.
Sen. Angus King, I-Maine, who caucuses with Democrats, supported the initial procedural vote to limit debate on a motion to start work on the bill. But he said Trump’s crusade against wind power could affect his final vote on passage of the bill.
“The president made an unfortunate statement this afternoon about wind power that undermines my confidence in the good faith of the administration,” King told MS NOW on Monday. “So that will influence my vote as well. But I do want to get on the bill so we can at least discuss it.”
Whitehouse downplayed Trump’s comments, saying the bill wouldn’t provide endless flexibility to the president. Barring any broken promises from agency heads, Whitehouse said Democrats should “chalk that up to him being 80.”
But the uncertainty cuts both ways, said Sen. Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz., who supports the bill. Any revised permitting deal negotiated by a larger Democratic majority next Congress would still need Trump’s signature to become law.
A few Republican senators would also need to support the measure to garner 60 votes in the Senate. And as lawmakers start their work to rein in Trump, he and Vice President JD Vance might not be so cooperative, Gallego told reporters last week.
“If the White House right now is willing to negotiate, great,” Gallego said. “Six months from now, after an impeachment, maybe they won’t be willing to negotiate. Or maybe we get too close to an election, and Vance doesn’t want to negotiate, right? So why not take this win now?”
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