Majority Leader Schumer Floor Remarks On The Need To Pass Bipartisan Permitting Reform

Washington, D.C. – Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) today spoke on the Senate floor on the Republicans’ unserious energy bill H.R.1 and the need to pass bipartisan permitting reform. Below are Senator Schumer’s remarks, which can also be viewed here:

Today, House Republicans are rolling out a partisan, dead-on-arrival, and unserious proposal for addressing America’s energy needs that they have laughably labeled H.R 1. It is a non-starter in the Senate.

Republicans’ so-called energy proposal is as bad and as partisan as it gets. H.R. 1 will lock America into the most expensive and volatile dirty sources of energy, and will set America back a decade or more in our transition towards clean, affordable energy.

Even a brief glance at the House GOP proposal is enough to show it’s not a serious package.

This package is a wish list for Big Oil, gutting important environmental safeguards on fossil fuel projects, while doing none of the important permitting reforms that would help bring transmission and clean energy projects online faster.  

Considering America’s serious energy challenges—and not to mention the disruptions caused by the War in Ukraine—it is bewildering to see House Republicans waste time on a Big Oil wish list instead of taking our energy needs seriously and ignoring clean energy as they do.

Thankfully, many Democrats and Republicans understand that the only way we will pass a genuine energy package this Congress is through bipartisan cooperation. I’m glad that there are good faith talks under way right now between both parties in both houses to figure out what sort of permitting deal is possible.

I strongly support these efforts, because Americans should not have to go broke just to meet their daily energy needs. We should work on a comprehensive, bipartisan permitting package that can secure enough votes to pass the Congress and reach the President’s desk.

Any serious permitting package must also focus on the needs of the future: as America transitions to clean energy, we need to take steps in Congress to ease that transition and ensure clean energy is reliable, accessible, and most importantly, affordable.

That includes efforts to expedite the onshoring and construction of industries critical to our economic and national security, like work we did in CHIPS and Science. Permitting reform is an essential step towards laying the foundation for a clean energy future, and Republicans must work with Democrats on a package that meets this challenge if we’re going to get anything done.

What House Republicans have come up with in the meantime, is something that falls pathetically short.

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