Louisiana
Attorney General Jeff Landry leads 18 state coalition in critical letter to
Senate Leadership
BATON
ROUGE, LA – Citing economic, legal, and procedural issues – Louisiana Attorney
General Jeff Landry is leading a coalition of 18 states in vocal opposition to
the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2022. The state chief legal
officers slammed the proposed legislation by U.S. Senator Joe Manchin as a
back-door attempt to impose the failed Clean Power Plan.
“The Biden Administration and its allies in Congress are
attempting to not only force unreliable renewables on hard-working Americans,
but also turn those consumers into bigger pawns of the green energy industry,”
said Attorney General Landry. “The DC elites, in a rushed process, want to restrict
the electric power grid by repealing the traditional authority of the states to
regulate their own resources and utility policies.”
In their letter to Senate Leadership, Attorney General
Landry and his colleagues explain how Manchin’s dangerous proposal contains
three interrelated provisions that, particularly when taken together,
eviscerate states’ ability to chart their own land-use and energy policies.
“First, it would authorize private companies to use
eminent domain against state land. Second, it would authorize FERC to command
utilities to construct entirely new transmission facilities whenever and
wherever FERC deems necessary. And third, it would authorize companies to
spread costs of constructing new transmission facilities onto residents of
other states, requiring citizens of one state to subsidize the agenda of
citizens in other states,” wrote the attorneys general. “These provisions
eviscerate state sovereign authority, commandeer companies to carry out the
will of a three-vote majority of FERC Commissioners, undermine the power of
each citizens’ vote to decide policies at the state level, and inevitably force
the citizens of our states to subsidize the costs of expensive energy policy
preferences of California and New York.”
They also added that the measure – which is expected to
be taken up without committee hearings or great public input – is an attack on
federalism, providing broad new authority to the Federal Energy Regulatory
Commission (FERC) that could unravel traditional authority between the states
and the federal government.
“We have spent nearly a decade defending our states
against the overreaching and illegal Clean Power Plan – eventually winning at
the U.S. Supreme Court; this new Act seeks to undo that work,” explained
Attorney General Landry. “Allowing private companies to use eminent domain and
pass costs to residents does not equate to independence or security; just more
profits off the backs of working families.”
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Joining Attorney General Landry in the letter are the
attorneys general from Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Georgia, Indiana,
Kansas, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, South Carolina, Tennessee,
Texas, Utah, and Virginia.