WASHINGTON— The Virginia legislative session ends tomorrow, and Democrats are sending a flurry of bills to support working families to GOP Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s desk. The DLCC is laser-focused on re-electing and electing these legislators who have focused on increasing economic opportunity, expanding access to health care, raising wages, and keeping communities safe.
Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee President Heather Williams issued the following statement:
“While the Republicans in the states are mimicking the chaos of the Trump Administration in Washington, Democratic legislators like the leaders in Virginia have remained focused on solving the issues most important to the working families they represent. Democratic victories in Virginia in 2023 made the impactful legislation we see today possible. This November, the DLCC is prepared to build on that progress as we hold the Democratic majority in the House of Delegates.”
Enshrine abortion rights, secure marriage equality, and restore voting rights for people who have finished serving time for a felony in three constitutional amendments
Improve health care by requiring transparency and timely answers about coverage from insurance companies
Make communities safer with gun safety legislation including an assault weapons ban and a ghost gun ban
Require health insurance to cover contraceptives and establish a right to contraception
The DLCC is the official arm of the Democratic Party with the sole mission of building Democratic power in the states and setting the national agenda at the state level. Over the last decade, we have fought cycle-over-cycle to gain a dozen new legislative chamber majorities and we are leading the effort to bring national attention and investment to our ballot level. State legislatures are the building blocks of our democracy and have the closest connections to Americans’ day-to-day lives. From protecting fundamental freedoms and voting rights to growing the middle class, the DLCC and state legislators are moving the Democratic agenda forward and shaping the future of this country.
Budget deal doubles funding for Helene relief (“One-time bonuses in; skill games out. Other proposals maintained include a one-time rebate for all tax-paying Virginians. Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s effort to do away with the much-maligned car tax was not resurrected, however.”)
Virginia Republican blames, attacks fired federal contractors as ‘not very smart’ (“Take Virginia Sen. Tammy Brankley Mulchi of Southside Virginia who, as she put it on the Senate floor on Thursday, was raised not to depend on ‘anybody for anything, and you’ve got to survive on your own.’ She accused fired federal independent contractors in need of relief of ‘piss-poor planning.'” Lovely.)
See below for a press release from Sen. Mark Warner’s office, regarding his “21 amendments to the GOP budget proposal to address the needs of working Americans and taking aim at the Trump administration’s lawlessness”; as well as video from Sen. Mark Warner’s weekly press availability earlier today. Among other things, Sen. Warner had the following to say about Trump’s betrayal of Ukraine and JD Vance’s bizarre speech and actions in Germany earlier this week:
“I don’t know if the president of the United States has actually even ever been briefed by his own intelligence community about who started the war in Ukraine. I do know this that it was Vladimir Putin, that he is the aggressor, that pulling the rug out from underneath our Ukrainian allies does enormous damage to us not only in Ukraine but in terms of the confidence that not just our European allies but allies around the world have. And you know who loves that? Vladimir Putin in Russia and president Xi in China. And I will bet you that they will ramp up their efforts because it appears like America is disarming itself to try to push back on disinformation.
Let’s face it, when the Vice President of the United States goes to Germany, visits Dachau, then lectures the Germans on how they ought to change their law ignoring the consequences of World War II, and subsequently meets with the farthest right Neo-Nazi party, I’ve never seen that in my lifetime. And having been in Munich during that period, there are going to be a whole lot of folks around the world who’s gonna whether they will ever trust us again and again. Who does that benefit? It benefits our adversaries.”
Ugh.
WARNER FILES AMENDMENTS TO REPUBLICAN BUDGET PLAN
WASHINGTON – As the Senate prepares for an all-night vote-a-rama on the Republican reconciliation budget bill agenda that will cut taxes for the ultra-wealthy at the expense of Virginia families, Sen. Mark R. Warner (D-VA), a member of the Senate Budget Committee, filed 21 amendments to the GOP budget proposal to address the needs of working Americans and taking aim at the Trump administration’s lawlessness.
“As President Trump and Senate Republicans try to move a budget resolution clearing the way to cut taxes for the richest Americans at the expense of the programs working families depend on, it’s important to understand what we’re talking about here: the GOP plans to provide tax breaks for billionaires while slashing health care, education and public safety and doing nothing about the really big problems most Americans are facing, like the rising costs of housing and child care,” said Sen. Warner. “I hope some of my Republican friends will think twice about supporting a budget plan that cuts taxes for the richest and doubles down on the chaos of the Trump-Musk administration.”
Specifically, Warner’s amendments would:
Put senators on the record for raising costs, gutting programs American families rely on
Create a point of order against any reconciliation bill that would not decrease the cost of housing for American families. Text
Establish a deficit-neutral reserve fund relating to providing benefits to survivors of miners who died due to pneumoconiosis. Text
Create a point of order against reconciliation legislation that would increase monthly student loan costs for borrowers of Federal student loans. Text
Establish a deficit-neutral reserve fund relating to preserving funding and current staffing levels at the Department of Education. Text
Establish a deficit-neutral reserve fund relating to providing affordable health care for American families, which may include making permanent the extended and expanded advance premium tax credits. Text
Create a point of order against reconciliation legislation that would increase the cost of child care for United State families. Text
Create a point of order against any reconciliation legislation that would increase health care costs for children receiving Medicaid. Text
Establish a deficit-neutral reserve fund relating to prohibiting cuts to critical health programs, which may include preventing the institution of a Medicaid per capita cap policy. Text
Put senators on the record on combating Trump-Musk lawlessness and corruption
Establish a deficit-neutral fund relating to protecting the American people from the People’s Republic of China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, transnational organized crime, and terrorism by prohibiting the mass termination of critical employees in the intelligence community. Text
Create a point of order against reconciliation legislation if certain Federal civil service laws are being violated. Text
Establish a deficit-neutral reserve fund relating to ensuring that employees of the Department of Justice, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and elements of the intelligence community are not subject to retaliation and firing due to political preferences of any Presidential administration. Text
Create a point of order against consideration of reconciliation legislation until the Congressional Budget Office certifies that health, education, research, law enforcement, and foreign aid funding authorized by Congress is not subject to programmatic funding delays, deferrals, or rescissions. Text
Create a point of order against considering funding legislation for the Office of the President while there is pending litigation alleging a violation of the Take Care Clause. Text
Create a point of order against reconciliation legislation that would rescind obligated or awarded amount made available under the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022. Text
Create a point of order against considering reconciliation legislation during a period during which there is an ongoing violation of the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Act of 1974, as determined by the Comptroller General of the United States. Text
Create a point of order against consideration of spending or revenue legislation during any period during which there is an ongoing violation of the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974, as determined by the Comptroller General of the United States. Text
Establish a deficit-neutral reserve fund relating to protecting duly-enacted appropriations from unconstitutional cancellation by the President. Text
Create a point of order against reconciliation legislation during any year in which an employee has been placed in administrative leave for more than a total of 10 work days. Text
Create a point of order against reconciliation legislation during any period in which there is litigation pending against the President or another Federal officer alleging a violation of certain provisions of title 5, United States Code. Text
Establish a deficit-neutral reserve fund relating to protecting classified and sensitive information on programs and individuals of the United States from being accessed by DOGE employees. Text
Establish a deficit-neutral reserve fund relating to prohibiting the closure or relocation of Federal agencies without congressional authorization. Text
Superb job by VA Speaker Don Scott last night on the Rachel Maddow Show. See below for video and a partial transcript:
“I live in a community in Portsmouth, Virginia. the Portsmouth Naval Hospital is there…a few miles away is the largest naval station in the world, Norfolk Naval Base. I’m a former Naval officer, a veteran. Every single day I get to see those folks and see how they’re being impacted. We have a Veterans Hospital, the largest one right across in Hampton, Virginia, and it’s on land where they have a lease there and then Elon Musk saying he’s going to end that lease. Well, who will take care of our veterans? Who’s going to protect them? These people have put their lives on the line many times before to protect our country and guess what? Many are Republicans and Democrats and they always stuck together. And right now, I’m saying I’m worried about our country a little bit. But it’s not the time to panic, it’s the time to fight. I’m worried because it looks like we’ve lost the ability to have any empathy for people, you know people whose spouses are worried about where they’re going to live, where the next paycheck is going to come from, they’re worried about their health care…are they going to be able to take care of their children, their families? We’re seeing this impact and it’s playing out in real time.
And so we have a responsibility in government, I believe in state government, we still have a responsibility to make sure that we’re protecting people. But we’re finding out the data, we don’t want to panic…because that’s what Donald Trump wants us to do, he wants everybody to go look around and and lose their minds and not sit down and look at the facts, look at the data. That’s why we formed this emergency committee so we can actually look at what’s happening in Virginia. That’s what we do. That’s what Americans always do. We live in the greatest country on the planet. Our Constitution has a a clear outline how we separate powers. If Congress and the Republicans there won’t do their jobs, then we’ll do our jobs and make sure that we step up to protect families, because that’s what our responsibility is.
As we’re hearing from people, they’re hurting here in Virginia. And it’s really sad that not one Republican – not one in Virginia! – will step up and say what the President of the United States is doing is wrong. Not one will step up and challenge Elon Musk, who’s now an unelected multi-billionaire! Not one will step up and challenge him. And so we have a responsibility I think to get the facts…and I think when we do that, then I think we will get some allies from the Republican Party. I hope we’ll get some. But if they don’t, I’m hoping that every single Democrat – because right now our country and our vision is on the line – will step in and help us.
We have an election here in November 2025. I’m hoping that every single Democrat in this country will come to our aid to help fight for the values that we’ve all grown up knowing and believing in the vision of America and the dream. And I think right now there are some people trying to take us backwards and we have a responsibility to fight for that and an obligation. When I took that oath as a Naval officer years ago, I haven’t forgotten it. And when I took that same oath here as Speaker of the House to protect and defend our Constitution, and right now it’s time for all patriots to step up and fight back…I’m hoping these Republicans will step up, they’re celebrating these job cuts in Virginia, when really they should be fighting back for us; we hope that they will.”
The following endorsement, by the Virginia League of Conservation Voters of Abigail Spanberger, is not surprising, but it is very illustrative of the choices we face this November. On the one hand, we’ve got Spanberger, with a 95% lifetime pro-environment score, as well as her vote for the Inflation Reduction Act — “the largest investment in climate and clean energy in U.S. history.” In STARK contrast, the other option is Republican Winsome Earle-Sears, who pretty much never talks about the climate crisis or environmental issues, but is part of a MAGA movement that is virulently ANTI-environment, ANTI-climate science (and science more broadly), ANTI-clean energy, PRO-fossil fuel industry, etc. So if you care at all about the climate crisis or the environment in general, your choice for Virginia governor this November will be *really* simple to make, and it definitely must NOT be Winsome Earle-Sears (or the even-more-extreme/anti-environment, if that’s possible, Dave LaRock, a rumored candidate for the VA GOP gubernatorial nomination in addition to Sears)!
ICYMI: Virginia League of Conservation Voters Endorses Abigail Spanberger for Governor of Virginia
Virginia LCV Executive Director: “We Are All-In to Elect Spanberger and Return Environmental Champions to the House of Delegates”
Virginia LCV’s Endorsement of Spanberger is Earliest in Gubernatorial General Election in 26-Year History
RICHMOND, Va. — The Virginia League of Conservation Voters (LCV) today announced their earliest gubernatorial general election endorsement in the organization’s 26-year history, backing Congresswoman Abigail Spanberger to serve as the next Governor of Virginia.
“I am grateful for the work of the Virginia League of Conservation Voters to protect our children’s future and Virginia’s natural resources, and I’m honored to earn their endorsement to serve as the next Governor of Virginia. Every Virginian deserves access to clean air and water — no matter their zip code,” said Spanberger. “As Governor, I look forward to working with all Virginians to preserve our beautiful Commonwealth and make sure Virginia’s economy continues to lead the way in creating clean, affordable energy.”
In endorsing Spanberger, Virginia LCV’s Board of Directors pointed to her environmental vision for the Commonwealth and her strong record in Congress. During her three terms representing Virginia’s Seventh District in the U.S. House of Representatives, Spanberger voted to pass the Inflation Reduction Act — the largest investment in climate and clean energy in U.S. history. As Chair of the U.S. House Agriculture Committee’s Conservation, Research, and Biotechnology Subcommittee, Spanberger worked to bring local farmers and producers to the table to protect the Commonwealth’s natural resources, combat climate change, and grow Virginia’s economy.
In addition to electing pro-environmental candidates to statewide office, a core component of Virginia LCV’s 2025 electoral work will be growing majorities in the House of Delegates to safeguard Virginia’s environment.
“Progress has been elusive the past four years with a governor hell-bent on pleasing a radical base and his corporate polluter friends. Under a new ‘Conservation Majority’ we get to go back to work pushing forward popular policies that protect our environment and secure a clean and affordable energy future for all Virginians,” said Michael Town, Executive Director, Virginia League of Conservation Voters. “We are all-in to elect Spanberger and return environmental champions to the House of Delegates – our future is on the ballot.”
“Abigail Spanberger is the leader Virginians need — someone who will work with the House to secure a clean, healthy environment, protect our children’s future, and safeguard Virginians and their livelihoods. My caucus and I are ready to partner with her to deliver real results for our Commonwealth,” said House Speaker Don Scott. “Her opponent would take us backward — weakening environmental protections, making disaster recovery more difficult, driving up everyday costs. With Abigail Spanberger as governor, we will advance real solutions that make life better, safer, and more affordable for all Virginians and generations to come.”
BACKGROUND
The Virginia League of Conservation Voters serves as the political voice of the Commonwealth’s conservation community, working to make sure Virginia’s elected officials recognize that the Commonwealth’s natural heritage is an environmental and economic treasure for all. Virginia LCV works with conservation leaders across Virginia and strives for a conservation majority in state government. The organization aims to secure good public policies on the state level and hold public officials accountable for their positions on environmental issues.
I had a chance to chat with Sen. Tim Kaine yesterday afternoon. See below for audio, as well as a very lightly edited transcript of our conversation (other than a bit of chit-chat at the beginning, which I’ve skipped.) As you can see, we covered a wide range of topics, although the main purpose of the call was to discuss Sen. Kaine’s effort to stop Trump’s bogus “energy emergency” (read more about that here) and to push back against Trump’s war on affordable, American-made (particularly solar and wind) energy. In addition, Sen. Kaine talked about:
His “five-point plan” – “courts, Congress, states, elections, activism” to fight Trump
The crucial importance of Virginia’s 2025 elections for governor, Lt. Governor, Attorney General and the entire House of Delegates. According to Sen. Kaine, “if you really want to do something, make sure the Virginia elections come out well in November 2025.”
The likelihood of “MLK March on Washington stuff” and other forms of non-violent, peaceful protest coming soon, “to demonstrate the popular revulsion at Trump,” particularly as people really start feeling the adverse impacts of Trump’s policies/actions.
How Senate Republicans are not “preserving [the filibuster ] to protect themselves against Democrats, they’re preserving it to protect Congressional Republicans against Trump.” Kaine adds that “there will come a moment where Donald Trump will turn to them and say I didn’t get what I wanted. I didn’t get what I wanted on the budget, I didn’t get what I wanted on border security or on the debt ceiling, you’ve gotta eliminate the filibuster so I can get what I want. And that is going to be internal to Congress, a major crisis but a really important battle.”
Trump’s disastrous foreign policy, including on Ukraine/Russia, China, tariffs and threats against allies like Canada, etc.
How when he goes to Mass in Richmond or whatever, people want to talk to him about what they’re experiencing – their anxiety, fear, anger, etc. According to Sen. Kaine: “I do kind of feel like I need to be a therapist in every meeting I walk into. And when am I going to get time to get the therapy I need?”
How he thinks he made the right decision to run for reelection in 2024. According to Sen. Kaine, “what I realized after the dust all settled is that if Kamala had won, I would have felt pretty comfortable if I had retired and I was exiting the Senate in January 2025. But when she lost, I realized it would have been the worst time to be leaving.”
How “we celebrate 250 years as a democracy in 2026 and I want to be able to celebrate it, not mourn it; I want it to be an anniversary, not a wake. And that’s my motivation.”
An explanation as to why he voted for some of Trump’s Cabinet picks – “is there any way we can beat this person or is there no way we can beat this person?”; “how bad are they?” “Who might be the alternative?”; the need to work with the Cabinet agencies as part of constituent work for Virginians; etc.
How the governor of Virginia SHOULD BE fighting strongly for Virginia against ANY president, whether of their own party or another party, to defend the Commonwealth’s people and interests. But Youngkin’s clearly not doing that. According to Sen. Kaine: “When I was governor if anything happened in Washington I didn’t like, I’d pick up the phone and I’d call Jim Webb and John Warner and say hey, what the heck? And it didn’t make a difference whether it was George Bush or Barack Obama was President, you’re not moving an aircraft carrier to Jacksonville Florida!”
And much, much more. See below, and thanks again to Sen. Kaine for his time and (as always) very thoughtful responses to questions.
Sen. Tim Kaine: “How are you doing?”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “Hanging in here. I mean what else can you do, right?”
Sen. Kaine: “Yeah, in some ways Anne says it’s easier for me because I have things I can do and a lot of folks who are just on the receiving end of all this abuse, who don’t have the natural thing to do, it’s even even more debilitating and frustrating. So…I get the way you’re feeling. I sure hear that from a lot of people.”
…You were you were a Department of Energy employee, right?”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “So I know that segues into what you want to talk about. I worked at the US Energy Information Administration for 17 years, so I’m well aware of what our energy situation is, I still follow it very closely. And you’re you’re absolutely right about what you’re saying here – I mean, there’s no energy emergency…”
Sen. Kaine: “I asked Janine to set this up because I said…Lowell is the energy guy, I’m not really an energy guy…so I asked her to set this up so I could kind of go in the weeds and explain to you what we’re doing and why.”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “Appreciate it.”
Sen. Kaine: “And I’ll just jump in and then I’d love to answer questions that you have. It is a little bit of a combined effort between Martin Heinrich, who is…kind of…the Senate Democratic energy guru who’s now the key Democrat on the committee. And then I have been kind of the guy on article one, article two powers, and not in favor of the President stepping all over Congress…On day one, the President issued this energy emergency declaration. And I remember reading it and there was a line in it and this is essentially a quote, it’s probably almost exact, he said the policies of the previous administration have driven the nation into into an emergency. And I was like, really? Really? So there’s sort of three points to this, and I’ll tell you the three points and then what is the mechanism we’re using to challenge it. The first point is there’s no emergency and the declaration is a sham. Last year we produced more oil than any year in American history. Last year we produced more natural gas than any year in American history. And the best part of last year is that more than 90% of power that came on to the grid last year was renewable. We’re accelerating renewables because of the IRA the and the infrastructure bill. So where’s the emergency? We’re also at an energy surplus in that we now produce more than we consume; that’s been the case since 2019 and that surplus has been growing annually. And we’ve been able to use that surplus for some other important purposes, like helping nations wean away from overreliance on Putin and petro-dictators.
So OK, the president declares that an energy emergency and then the first thing he starts to do is undo energy projects – so things that have relied on the tax credits and the Inflation Reduction Act. Governor Youngkin has announced a series of economic development deals that really relied on those dollars in in the six months or year those are sort of up in the air with a question mark by them now. We got a huge grant that we advocated for the Port of Virginia to electrify all their crane operations. That grant is up in the air right now. The offshore wind, if you read there was a great … article the other day about Dominion’s offshore wind that’s sort of got an asterisk or question mark by it now. And yesterday the Department of Energy laid off the grant department that has been doing the grants, suggesting that those will dry up – grants for electric vehicle recharging stations pursuant to the infrastructure bill…those are drying up. So there’s no energy emergency except for the emergency that Donald Trump is creating by undoing energy projects which are both killing jobs but also will have the natural effect of causing prices to go up, because if demand is going up and you’re taking supply offline and shrinking projects, you’re going to hurt people’s pocketbook.
So what’s it about? Well, it’s pretty clear what it’s about is Trump made a promise to big oil execs…you invest in me and you will get a cut back on all these environmental protections. And one of the attendees at that dinner said Donald Trump said you’ll get it on day one. Well they got it on day one. And what did they get? They got this emergency order that carved back on NEPA, the Clean Water Act…the Endangered Species Act, the Clean Air Act and a whole series of other acts. And it even suggested, its first suggestion was federal agencies should be more aggressive in using eminent domain to take people’s property for energy production siting and transmission. The real game in this emergency order is at the very end, you’re reading it and it’s saying we need to do more energy production. But at the end of the order it defines energy production specifically excluding wind…oil, gas…nuclear…and hydro is included, but wind and solar are specifically excluded. So this is a big giveaway to big oil, and all of these environmental laws that Congress passed that are good laws as you point out – Clean Water Act has helped Richmond rebound by cleaning up the James River and that’s been part of our renaissance. So we know these regulations, even if they’re not always exactly perfect, they’ve generally been very laudatory and helpful both to the environment and to the economy.
So there is an unusual provision in federal law that allows even one Senator to file a challenge to a president’s declaration of an emergency. And we are using that. It’s very little used, because usually presidents who do it, it’s like Donald Trump declared a national emergency after Covid, but it *was* a national emergency! Biden continued…So you usually don’t have to grapple with the sham emergency. But if we let Trump get away with declaring a sham emergency and then doing a lot of damage to our environmental laws, he’ll do it again and again and again. So Martin and I have filed it, it is ripened for consideration, it bypasses the committee, we get a floor vote, we’ve locked in that the floor vote will occur sometime between now and next Friday – it is likely to occur early next week – there will be six hours of debate about the emergency declaration, three hours for each side (I don’t expect the Republicans will use all theirs; the Dems we will use ours to drive these points – it’s a sham emergency, Trump is hurting American energy and it’s a giveaway to big oil). And we’ll drive those repetitively, those of us who take the floor. What is our expectation? I don’t think the Republicans are yet sufficiently backboned to stand up against Trump six weeks after inauguration, although they are seeing projects get canceled in their state, they’re seeing job losses and they’ll see energy prices going up. But we have the ability to lay the record that, hey, look, Donald Trump’s own kind of self-created emergency is killing jobs and raising prices. We make that argument, say no Republicans are not enough go along with us, we get the opportunity to come back and reinstitute the challenge every six months. So maybe we’ll win, although Trump would veto it, but if we don’t win we come back six months from now when energy prices have gone up and jobs have been lost because of these policies, and we explain that with the hey I told you so this is going to happen.
So there there are a few things where the minority can go on offense. This is one of those things. I have done a pretty thorough study of parts of either Senate procedure or statutary law that allow even one Senator to challenge action and get a guaranteed vote on the floor. And this is my first use of one of these mechanisms. But I’m going to be doing a lot more of it.
And then the last thing to say is it it fits into the the broader category of what I’m calling the kind of the five-point plan which is, it’s Congress, courts, states, elections and activism…or let me say courts, Congress, states, elections, activism because the court battles started on Inauguration Day. We at least had the benefit of having Project 2025, so we had some understanding what was coming. We coordinated very carefully lawsuits to be filed and we have been filing lawsuit after lawsuit after lawsuit with the network of of lawyers and others we’ve been working with. Our batting average is good, not perfect…Trump loses one and says they’re going to appeal, so these things have a way of working up in the system. But we are very very vigorous. I led efforts yesterday to get 28 Senators on board with a a case filed against Trump’s illegal sacking of the Inspector General. So we’re doing more and more and we’re going to keep doing them every day in Congress. We’ve got leverage on this budget battle that’s coming up. We’ve got leverage on the debt ceiling battle that’s coming up. When we have felt that there was even a scintilla of a chance that we could get Republicans to consider voting against Cabinet nominees we’ve gone after them. We were able to get a vote against Kennedy, a vote against Tulsi, three votes against Hegseth. We haven’t defeated anybody yet but when we can dent somebody, we do.
And the third one is activism at the state level. And you know, we don’t have a governor yet willing to speak up about how Trump is hurting Virginia. Hopefully that will start. I saw that Governor Youngkin today said there was be some kind of a package for affected federal employees.”
Blue Virginia (Lowell) “Yeah, Rachel Maddow was mocking him – did you see that last night?”
Sen. Kaine: “I did…But I give Don Scott credit in the absence of the governor willing to shine a spotlight on how this is hurting Virginia, the General Assembly is putting together a a team to kind of gather the data and that’s important because they can share with us and we can put it in floor speeches and and use to create a legislative record here.
Fourth is obviously elections. The Virginia elections are going to be the most watched elections in America in 2025 and just like 2017, the Virginia election was not only important about Virginia, but it sent a national message that we’re revolted by Trump policies.
And then the last is activism. And we see that building up – you know protests, sure USAID employees, but protests in state capitals. And I think you’re going to see that build and grow, because the degree of disquiet about what Trump’s doing… I mean I did a roundtable with workers and farmers in northwestern Virginia last Friday, and all of them – all of them – no federal employees all of them are engaged in USDA programs to help farmers succeed, all of them know tariffs will cream them, all of them know mass deportations will hollow out their workforce. The ag sector tends to be in the redder parts of America, but they’re terrified about Trump and that awareness is growing.
So anyway, again, knowing that you’re the energy guy, this is a quirky little thing that I’m doing, but I thought you in particular would appreciate the quirks of it. And so that’s why I wanted to just call and kind of walk it through with you.”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “I appreciate it. I mean, it’s part of [Trump’s] assault on fact and reason and science and everything. I mean, it’s not just an energy – he just makes up reality and it’s very disturbing…”
Sen. Kaine: “Yeah, Ukraine invaded Russia, right?”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “Right, I mean that’s the latest one and that’s just insane. But I mean, I feel like this gets at the pace. You were talking about maybe we’ll revisit this in 6 months or whatever, but do we even have six months? The pace he’s going is so frenetic and disturbing in his institution of apparently what he’s aiming for is an authoritarian, maybe even like a dictatorship basically.”
Sen. Kaine: “Yeah, kind of an Orban situation.”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “Yeah, well some people have compared it to Orban; it could be something like that or it could be worse in some ways or better in some ways. I don’t know. But it feels worse at this point. I mean the types of things he’s doing. But do we have months? I mean, I don’t know if you saw this I posted – you said you read Blue Virginia every day –
Sen. Kaine: “I do”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “Well that’s great. I mean, because I just posted on Don Beyer – he had a town hall with the Del Ray Citizens Association and he was talking about that we’re getting close to where we need Civil Disobedience a la – this is almost a direct quote – a la Nelson Mandela and Gandhi. I mean do you feel like that’s where we’re headed at this point or can we just…”
Sen. Kaine: “Yeah, I think of more of the MLK, you know MLK March on Washington stuff. And I would suspect that you’re going to start to see that. And you know it would probably be timed around something important. But I think the combination of people distressed by, wait, you said you were going to bring my prices down and now you’re talking about Greenland and egg prices are going up…so whether it’s people who feel like he hasn’t met his promises, federal workers that have been sacked, kids in cancer trials that are being carved back because of NIH funding cuts, there’s going to be such a broad coalition, the moment may come around the Republican reconciliation program which is to slash Medicaid, to do tax breaks for the wealthy. We saw that generated tremendous activism in the summer of 2017. That might be the moment. And it’s going to come a lot faster than the summer. You know, you’re probably following the news today, the two Republican Houses are trying to figure out what their Reconciliation timing and strategy is. But we know the outcome: slash programs for everyday people to give tax breaks to the wealthiest. I think that might be the the moment that would generate the intense citizen activism. But I think that moment is coming soon. I don’t think it’s six months from now, I think it’s coming soon.”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “I mean, we don’t have six months right? I mean, if we just let this go for six months and there’s no really serious pushback. I know we have the courts=, but if Trump says I’m not going to obey the courts, I think he’s building to that too.”
Sen. Kaine: “I do too. I mean today he apparently his lawyers appeared in a case involving USAID where they were told no, we issued a court order, you’ve got to turn back on the funding. And at least the representation is they said we’re still not going to do it. So that that crisis is coming. There will be another crisis that will come soon…in the Senate. And this is my prediction, the Senate Republicans really want to maintain the current filibuster cloture rule because they want Democrats to be able to stop Trump’s nuttiness that they feel guilty about but they won’t speak up against.
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “That’s interesting, I was wondering why…”
Sen. Kaine: “Yeah, John Thune has already given a couple of speeches since becoming Majority Leader, saying we are going to preserve the filibuster, we’re going to preserve that. They’re not preserving it to protect themselves against Democrats, they’re preserving it to protect Congressional Republicans against Trump. They know what he’s doing, a lot of what he wants to do, is wrong, and they would like Democrats to have the ability to continue to block it. But there will come a moment where Donald Trump will turn to them and say I didn’t get what I wanted. I didn’t get what I wanted on the budget, I didn’t get what I wanted on border security or on the debt ceiling, you’ve gotta eliminate the filibuster so I can get what I want. And that is going to be internal to Congress, a major crisis but a really important battle. And so we’ve got to fight on all of these fronts.
You know, I’m like you, you sometimes comment in your writings in Blue Virginia when somebody says oh it’s all over we’ve lost, you always say no, you can’t assume that yet, without sugar coating or whitewashing stuff, you always tell people not to give in to like a complete despair about where we are. And you won’t be surprised that I’m even more upbeat than you.”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “Well, you’re an optimist. My father was an optimist, my mother was a pessimist, I would say I am a realist. I mean, I like facts, I like data and I like information. And I like to analyze that and figure out what actually is true and what makes sense to do. I don’t think we should get too optimistic about what’s going on and just assume things will work out. No. We make it work out. We’re the ones who make – you know that expression…the arc of the moral universe bends towards justice? No, *we* bend it – it doesn’t just bend on its own. We’re the ones, so we have to take action, right, I agree with that. But yeah, so Beyer seems to be going towards more Mandela and Gandhi, which I guess is more like strikes and…just basically don’t go to work or whatever and shut the country down. But you don’t sound like you’re there yet.”
Sen. Kaine: “No I’m not. But know MLK did stuff like that too, you know the bus boycotts. And it wasn’t just peaceful protest on the Washington Mall, I mean it was direct action against police that were fire hosing you or against department stores that wouldn’t let you sit there. So figuring out what is the…right point to demonstrate the popular revulsion at Trump. Again, I think the opportunity around this budget, you know slashing Medicaid for low-income kids, moms and seniors and nursing homes to give tax breaks to the rich, that might be the opportunity. But when I get asked in Virginia…it’s nice to be in Virginia frankly because I get to say if you really want to do something, make sure the Virginia elections come out well in November 2025. We want to do stuff before then, but you know that the Virginia results get over interpreted by everybody because we’re the only game in town…”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “And that gets at that Democrats have to be fired up….if Democrats are fired up they’ll turn out to vote. That’s what happened in 2017; 2009, Democrat were asleep and Creigh Deeds lost by 17 points. When you ran, I mean we had Hurricane Katrina hit and then Bush’s approval rating plummeted…so that’s going to affect things too…but I can’t do anything about Trump’s approval rating other than, you know, making the case against Trump…that’s all I can do.
…and then on foreign policy, what do we do about that? Trump is literally changing American values as we speak, to we support dictators and war criminals…I mean, what can you do vis-a-vis the budget or reconciliation or whatever?”
Sen. Kaine: “I mean…so a couple of things that Trump is doing that are disastrous, and I agree with you, is one he’s going back to what he did in term one, which is alienating allies, cozying up to adversaries…even imposing tariffs on Canada under a national security waiver – wait, they’re an ally! The national security waiver was designed to go against an adversary. So he continually gets it flipped where I’m going to alienate allies and cozy up to adversaries. And this latest thing about Ukraine being the aggressor in the war is just, you know, he’s sucking up to Vladimir Putin and willing to alienate the entire West to do so. The other thing that Trump’s doing is wrong is what’s going on in the negotiations…in Saudi Arabia about the Ukraine war – have a negotiation that includes Russia but not Ukraine. Remember that Trump negotiated the end of the Afghan war with the Taliban but would not allow the Afghan government at the table. How did that work out?”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “Yeah, that didn’t work out very well.”
Sen. Kaine: “Yeah, and it’s not going to work out any better you know keeping Ukraine at arms length in the peace negotiation. And then he’s going to be viewed as the guy that lost Europe, he’s going to be the biggest loser in the history of American foreign policy.”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “And then China’s sitting there and Taiwan’s got to be like oh sh**, you know, because right now if I were Xi I’d be looking at this and saying they’re not going to stop us if we go after Taiwan.”
Sen. Kaine: “And we do see China, Russia and Iran celebrating Trump’s actions, you know cutting off USAID funding – that’s great, you know, please retreat America! Iran and Russia celebrate a little more like pat themselves on the back and high five. China’s a little more cagey, but they rush investments into the areas when America retreats.”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “Well China has the money to do it. I mean Russia’s what, [10%] of our economy, whatever it is? It’s tiny. China’s a huge economy and they have the money to, they’ve run huge trade surpluses, they have plenty of currency of hard currency to use. But I don’t know what we can do about this exactly. I’m watching this and it’s very distressing…I’m worried about Ukraine…if this continues they’re going to lose, and that’s horrifying to me, I’m a huge Ukraine supporter. So anyway, I don’t know, I mean obviously you can’t solve all these problems, but this is just the stuff that’s going on day in day out. I mean, do you feel like you’ve got a fire hose on you pretty much constantly?”
Sen. Kaine: “Yeah, I mean I do. And you know like if I go to church in Richmond now, the time I’m in church after Mass is longer than the time during Mass because it’s like it’s like a confessional. My church is pretty heavily a refugee church, it’s a lot of Congolese refugees family. So everybody’s in a household where there’s probably some mixed immigration status, citizen permanent resident, refugee, undocumented – everybody’s worried. A lot of federal workers in my church…a lot of Northern Virginia federal workers during Covid relocated to Richmond, bought houses, [remote] work made that possible. Now you know are they forced to go back, do they lose their job completely? So it is a very intense time. And yeah I do kind of feel like I need to be a therapist in every meeting I walk into. And when am I going to get time to get the therapy I need?…Be a therapist in every meeting I walk into.”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “Are you glad you ran for reelection?”
Sen. Kaine: “I really am.”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “I mean, now that this is all happening? You didn’t see this?”
Sen. Kaine: “No, I’ll tell you exactly. You know it was hard to decide to do it. And I realized, you know we won handily – nine points, Kamala won by six without doing a single event in Virginia, Walz didn’t into a single event in Virginia, Trump and JD Vance both campaigned in Virginia; we won handily. But what I realized after the dust all settled is that if Kamala had won, I would have felt pretty comfortable if I had retired and I was exiting the Senate in January 2025. But when she lost, I realized it would have been the worst time to be leaving. The Senate is quirky, so you’ve got to be here a while before you realize oh wait a minute, I can use this privileged motion to challenge the president’s executive order and seize the floor…it would have been the wrong time to leave…”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “I’m very glad you did. I just said that a little snarkily but I’m serious though, this is crazy, and…Don Beyer said you guys aren’t getting much sleep, he said he isn’t and his colleagues in the House aren’t, so I presume you’re not getting a lot. I mean it’s just got to be stressful so I can see where you’re like oh s*it, what did I do, I could have gotten out of here? But you’re not that type of guy…and I’m glad you’re not.”
Sen. Kaine: “I mean you know my feeling too is we celebrate 250 years as a democracy in 2026 and I want to be able to celebrate it, not mourn it; I want it to be an anniversary, not a wake. And that’s my motivation.”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “That’s a good way to look at it. I mean that’s true, it’s coming up pretty soon. I haven’t really been thinking about that too much but you’re right. I mean I was alive and you were too for the 200th, and now we’re going to see the 250th, what’s it going to bring? We don’t know what’s it going to bring.”
Sen. Kaine: “What’s it going to bring?”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “But I guess one of the things was I wanted to ask you about the confirmation votes…The main thing is how Democrats resist this Administration. And there’s a lot of agitation online certainly and I think it’s not just online; I’ve seen polling, Democrats are not happy. their approval rating of Congress is very…it’s bad…But…so you guys voted for several of Trump’s Cabinet picks, including like Rubio got 99 to zero. And now you see like, let’s take Rubio, look at what he’s doing right now. And I’m looking at this and I’m like, how the hell did he win 99 to nothing – the guy’s horrendous. He’s over there in Saudi Arabia…he’s just caving to Trump whatever Trump wants him to do.”
Sen. Kaine: “So here’s the answer to this one. And I’ll give you my thought process; I don’t want to answer for anybody else. So let me just tell you the way I look at this. When I’m going into any Cabinet or major agency head, my thought is, is there any way we can beat this person or is there no way we can beat this person? So that’s the initial fork. If there’s any way we can beat the person, if it’s a 5% chance, I go all-in against them. I don’t think there’s been anybody who’s been tougher on any Cabinet nominee than I was on Hegseth at the DOD hearing, I think. And so I thought I might be able to get somebody. And I was tough on Vought and I was tough on RFK. And if I think there’s a chance even if it turns out I’m wrong later, I go all out on it and vote against them…I sometimes vote yes, I sometimes vote no, and that’s what I did in the first Trump Administration. What are factors that I use? You know, how bad are they? Who might be the alternative? If it wasn’t Marco Rubio, they were talking about Rick Grenell who was a Trump Administration guy who would have been an absolute disaster. But the other thing that’s a real factor for me, Mark would probably say the same, he may not say it quite this way – a third of my staff all they do is constituent service. So the big agencies – DOD, DHS, State for passports, Postal Service, Social Security, Medicaid, Medicare, the VA, the IRS – we’re on the phone with those agencies every day on behalf of Virginians who want a tax refund or their VA benefit hasn’t been ruled on yet. And when we call the Congressional liaison office for the VA, I’m calling about Joe Smith from Chesapeake and their claim, they know whether I voted for them or not. Now, it would be nice to assume that they’re going to treat every constituency all exactly the same and of course they should, of course they should – I try to when people call my office. But I found over the course of doing this now for 12 years that you get better customer service for the Virginian who need these agencies every day if you have some level of cooperation with that agency. And a confirmation vote for somebody who is going to get confirmed, 100% they’re going to get confirmed, they don’t need your vote, they’re going to get confirmed anyway, but it does help you advocate for Virginia sometimes if you have not been hostile to them.”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “Right but does it also normalize someone like a Kristi Noem or whoever it is, that you know, hey she got a bunch of Democratic votes, you know…”
Sen. Kaine: “It could. You and I know about Kristi Noem, she’s not the one making immigration policy, it’s Stephen Miller. She is an implementer not a creator of the policy – that’s White House policy from Stephen Miller. But like the DHS that you might not think this, but DHS is one of tied with the VA for the agency we do the most work with, because every time somebody you know oh man I’m going abroad on a trip next week and I forgot I got to get my passport. Or I got pickpocketed and how do I get home. Or my mother wants to come over for my daughter’s wedding from India, we got to get a visa for her. And then all the deportation and other issues which are huge. DHS is one of the most frequent flyers in terms of communicating with them to help Virginians.”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “I do think there’s a disconnect…I think that a lot of the grassroots activists don’t understand why, they see Democrats voting for these horrible Trump picks or going to his inauguration or whatever it is and they feel like it’s normalizing him, we’re not really fighting back seriously, we said he’s an existential threat and then it’s like wait you voted to confirm this one and that one. And it’s hard. I get it and I follow this stuff very closely, but for just someone who casually observes American politics, it’s like wait a minute…”
Sen. Kaine: “Look, if you ask people, the everyday person what does a US senator do? We we go to committee meetings and we vote on the floor of the Senate. The thought that a third of my staff does nothing but constituent service for 8 1/2 million Virginians, that’s not what people think about when they think about a Senate, that’s one of the most important things we do.”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “Right, I’m just saying people are angry, upset, worried, a lot of things out there and they want to see their Democratic representatives feel like they’re really fighting, shutting down the Senate, slowing it down to a crawl like McConnell probably would have done…that type of thing. I’m sure you’re aware of this, but that’s sort of I’m noticing this…I know social media isn’t real life, I mean it is real people, but I know it’s not maybe representative exactly, but you see the polling too, people aren’t thrilled, I mean the Democratic approval is the lowest right now…for the Democratic…Congress people, it’s very low.”
Sen. Kaine: “You know…and on that, I mean I guess that is true nationally, but I understand Virginia not 49 other states. And we just had a good November in Virginia following a good November last year in Virginia, and I think we’re going to have a good November in 2025 in Virginia. So there are some things about national politics that do make me scratch my head. The longer I do it, the more I think I understand one place and I’m mystified by everybody else. But anyway, now, the effect on Virginia is as dramatic maybe more dramatic than any other place.”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “Because of the federal workforce and retirees and contractors. I mean, you always hear 140,000 federal employees, but you’ve got more than that of retirees I believe, and then I don’t know how many contractors there are, I haven’t seen a good number on that…”
Sen. Kaine: “And then the families.”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “And then the businesses that rely on…so all of that it’s probably hundreds and hundreds of thousands if not millions that are affected…it’s huge.”
Sen. Kaine: “I mean, if you just go veterans, one out of nine Virginians is a veteran. And that’s not one out of nine adults, that’s just one out of nine Virginians is a veteran. So then you add active duty guard, military, contractor, DOD civilian, federal civilian, their families who rely on them…you’re talking one out of three probably.”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “Right, and what percent of the economy does this account for or directly or maybe second order effect?”
Sen. Kaine: “I’ve seen that number and my memory might be playing a trick on me but I think it’s about 40%.”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “And Youngkin’s…Rachel Maddow was…mocking him, but yeah, he hasn’t been fighting for Virginia. If you were Governor right now, you’d be fighting for Virginia. If Bob McDonnell would have probably back in the day.”
Sen. Kaine: “No, when I was governor if anything happened in Washington I didn’t like, I’d pick up the phone and I’d call Jim Webb and John Warner and say hey, what the heck? And it didn’t make a difference whether it was George Bush or Barack Obama was President, you’re not moving an aircraft carrier to Jacksonville Florida…And they they wanted me to call them on that…Warner would go to bat against the Republican president, Webb would go to bat against the Democratic president. They’re going to go to bat for Virginia. And the governor would make that call instantaneously. I’ll give you an example and then I got to go. When the first kind of funding cut stuff started to come through, of course Trump’s not telling the Senate I’m going to do this. And so how do we get the information about it? We get it because people start calling our office. The first people that call are usually the governor calling the Senate, hey the Medicaid portal is turned off, nobody can register for Medicaid. One of my colleagues, Jeff Merkley, got that call from the governor of Oregon, the Medicaid portal is turned off. He spread the word among among colleagues. I asked my staffer, call down to DMAS in Richmond and ask if the Medicaid portal has been turned off because I don’t know, maybe it’s just some states not all, or maybe it was a glitch in Oregon. My staffer Samantha calls DMAS, is the Medicaid portal turned off? Well, we’ll have to check and get back to you; they wouldn’t confirm…Governor Youngkin’s opening salvo was yeah these funding things are paused but it’s not going to affect any individual benefits. Later they had to come back and correct that, no the Medicaid portal had been turned off. But the point is, everybody else was getting the fire alarm call from the governor right away, our Medicaid portal is turned off. Mark and I couldn’t even get a confirmation of that.”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “Yeah that’s really wild. I mean, that’s what the Founding Fathers believed that each state would fiercely defend its prerogatives, that each body of the the legislature would defend…And if that breaks down, I don’t know, all know bet are off…”
Sen. Kaine: “And the vote will be next week so we’ll see how it goes.”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “Yeah I’ll keep an eye on it, definitely.”
Sen. Kaine: “Okay, thanks man.”
Blue Virginia (Lowell): “Thanks a lot, take care.”
Here are a few international, national and Virginia news headlines, political and otherwise, for Thursday, February 20. As Paul Krugman says“Why the frantic lying? I suspect that it’s because Musk, Trump and their Congressional allies are flailing. I don’t think any past administration has ever failed so thoroughly in its first month…As I see it, the explosion of lies is a sign that the Musk/Trump Administration is cracking up after just one month in office. So what should Democrats do? Nothing. Trump and Musk have created this situation, even as they try to undermine our democracy. They should be forced to own the disaster they made, and not a single Democrat should vote to help them out.”
Trump’s “dictator” slam of Zelensky rocks Capitol Hill (In fact, Zelenskyy is a democratically elected and popular leader whose country was invaded by forces under the orders of Russian DICTATOR Vladimir Putin, who is Trump’s BFF. Yes, we really are living in the “Upside Down” at this point.)
Trump Is the American President of Putin’s Dreams (“Trump is repeating Putin’s lies about the war in Ukraine and ready to give Russia everything it wants, no matter the cost to Ukraine, our European allies, or even our own country.”)
Abandoning Ukraine would damage U.S. credibility (The moronic WaPo editorial board as always is waaaayyy behind and waaayyy too timid. In fact, Trump has ALREADY greatly damaged U.S. credibility, maybe beyond repair. Wake up, WaPo!)
DOGE Has ‘God Mode’ Access to Government Data (“The president’s special commission now has an unprecedented ability to view and manipulate information at many federal agencies.” WILDLY unacceptable!)
Hegseth orders major Pentagon spending cuts (“With the president smashing norm after norm, even lawmakers within his party have feared for their personal safety, and at least one has told confidants that it has swayed his decision-making.”)
A Cautionary Tale for Trump Appointees (“The evidence of the past few days suggests that they are all deluding themselves.” Rubio, for instance, completely sold his soul and will be an eternal disgrace to America.)
CNN Poll: Americans worried by Trump’s push to expand power (“A broad majority feel the president isn’t doing enough to address the high prices of everyday goods. And 52% say he’s gone too far in using his presidential power, with similar majorities wary of his push to shutter federal agencies and elevate Elon Musk to a prominent role in his efforts to reshape the government.”)
Bills to ban personal use of campaign funds clear Virginia legislature (This is like the bare minimum they could do. Unfortunately, they didn’t do the big things, like banning contributions from state-regulated companies like Dominion Energy, limiting the amount of money that any single donor can contribute, etc.)
See below for a press release, from Sen. Tim Kaine’s and Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-NM)’s offices regarding Trump’s wildly counterproductive “war on affordable, American-made energy, which will raise energy costs for Americans and kill high-quality jobs.” And, of course, as the press release points out, after four years of the Biden administration’s pro-energy policies, “America is producing more energy than ever before including both conventional and renewable sources.” Yet Trump has, absurdly:
“…declared an energy emergency as a pretext to assert authority he lacks and to justify a raft of actions meant to lock us into decades more dependence on the fossil fuels that are driving the climate crisis. There is no energy emergency. There is a climate emergency. Trump’s actions will make it worse.”
The other issue, of course, is that if Trump can just make up his own reality, invent a crisis and declare a fake “emergency” on this issue, he can do it on ANY issue, no matter how absurd. Which is why this is good to see:
“Kaine and Heinrich introduced legislation to terminate the national energy emergency President Trump declared.The legislation is privileged, meaning that the Senate will be required to vote on it. The vote is expected next week.”
Now, of course, that legislation is unlikely to pass the US Senate, as Republicans are showing close to zero willingness to buck Trump, but still, it’s worth getting this on the record, and having Democratic US Senators explain, on the Senate floor, why Trump’s fake “energy emergency” is wrong, absurd, dangerous, unwarranted, illegal, etc.
With that, here’s the press release and video from the press conference:
KAINE, HEINRICH, AND ENVIRONMENTAL LEADERS HOLD PRESS CONFERENCE ON TRUMP’S WAR ON AFFORDABLE, AMERICAN-MADE ENERGY
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, U.S. Senators Tim Kaine (D-VA) and Martin Heinrich (D-NM) and environmental leaders held a press conference calling for the end of President Trump’s war on affordable, American-made energy, which will raise energy costs for Americans and kill high-quality jobs. The senators were joined by Natural Resources Defense Council’s Senior Vice President of Climate Jackie Wong, Sierra Club’s Executive Director Ben Jealous, and League of Conservation Voters’ Senior Vice President of Government Affairs Tiernan Sittenfeld.
In the hours following his inauguration on January 20, 2025, President Trump signed a slew of executive orders, including the national energy emergency order, to withdraw support for renewable energy—despite its benefits to America’s economy and environment—and grant his administration new powers to promote fossil fuels at the cost of bedrock environmental laws. Kaine and Heinrich introduced legislation to terminate the national energy emergency President Trump declared. The legislation is privileged, meaning that the Senate will be required to vote on it. The vote is expected next week.
“We are producing more energy now than at any other point in our history, and the U.S. is the envy of the world when it comes to energy innovation and production. The passage of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and Inflation Reduction Act have accelerated clean energy projects and created jobs, and we are on an amazing trajectory,” said Senator Kaine. “Trump’s sham emergency threatens to screw all of that up. Why? Because he’d rather benefit Big Oil and suspend environmental protections than lower costs and create jobs for the American people. I hope my colleagues will join me in voting to terminate President Trump’s emergency.”
“America is producing more energy than ever before including both conventional and renewable sources. This is happening because of the year-over-year certainty Democrats created with tax structures and permitting that has allowed us to make solar, wind, and energy storage cheaper, faster, and less capital intensive to add to the electric grid. We made it possible to build big things in American once again,” said Senator Heinrich, Ranking Member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. “But now, Trump’s fake emergency declaration is causing enormous uncertainty. If you’re thinking about opening a new factory, you don’t know what your tax structure will be in the next 12 months. If you’re trying to site and build a new transmission line, the federal agencies you work with just had a ton of their expert staff sacked, making it more difficult to get a permit. This is going to kill skilled trades jobs and drive up the cost of your electricity bills by as much at $480 a year by 2030. Trump’s war on affordable, American-made energy is killing jobs and raising costs on working families.”
“Trump falsely declared an energy emergency as a pretext to assert authority he lacks and to justify a raft of actions meant to lock us into decades more dependence on the fossil fuels that are driving the climate crisis. There is no energy emergency. There is a climate emergency. Trump’s actions will make it worse,” said Jackie Wong, Senior Vice President for Climate and Energy, Natural Resources Defense Council.
“In the last four years, if you’re under 52, you’ve seen something happen for the first time in your adult life, which is America opening big new factories from coast to coast to give birth to big new industries,” said Ben Jealous, Executive Director of the Sierra Club. “Trump threatened the jobs of 77,000 workers in the wind industry on day one, sent shockwaves through their families and communities, and threatened to derail the United States from seizing the greatest economic opportunity on Planet Earth right now. Donald Trump’s objective here is to cut taxes and allow fossil fuel industries to continue to destroy beautiful places across this country in the interest of greed when we’ve got a better alternative. It’s time for our country’s people to rise up and demand the President of the United States put their interests first.”
“We are NOT in an energy emergency. In fact, Trump inherited a thriving clean energy economy with more than 400,000 new jobs and more cheaper and cleaner energy than ever before. Yet Trump and Musk are desperate to impound, freeze, and repeal the very clean energy investments that lower energy bills and create jobs – the majority of which are in districts currently represented by Republicans – so they can pay for tax cuts for their billionaire buddies. Trump and Musk are firing civil servants who help keep our electricity grid safe and secure and gutting clean energy industries that employ thousands of other workers. And Trump and Musk are threatening our air and water and pushing to open up our most precious public lands for permanent destruction so Trump can make good on his promise to Big Oil CEOs to drill, drill, drill,” said Tiernan Sittenfeld, LCV SVP for Government Affairs.
Great job by Rachel Maddow, skewering the godawful MAGA Glenn Youngkin:
“So here’s the local press coverage on what Governor Glenn Youngkin had to do today. Dateline Richmond: Governor Glenn Youngkin said today that the state is preparing an aid package for Virginians losing their jobs in the Trump administration’s gutting of the federal workforce. But he said the cuts are necessary.
In his first extended public remarks on the cuts, Youngkin told reporters that he feels deep concern for those who are anxious about their employment future as the White House purges people at almost every agency. Hundreds of workers at the FAA lost their jobs over the weekend, for example, and a sweeping elimination of workers ahead of a Tuesday deadline affected mapmakers and cancer researchers and FEMA staffers among thousands more cut over the past few weeks.
But Youngkin defended the Trump administration’s actions, which disproportionately affect Virginia as one of the top states in the country for federal employment and spending, with more than 140,000 federal workers. Even one of Youngkin’s signature achievements – a computer science laboratory high school in Richmond – has been touched by the cuts, with cancellation of a federal grant for a teacher residency program. The governor said he wanted it known that, quote, we understand and we’re here to help, he said. The state, quote, will have the ability to support federal workers through any job dislocation.
But the governor declined to provide details about what kind of help the state is prepared to offer. He said that when the plan is ready, quote, I want to communicate it in a package; we’ll have a good one for you. Well get back to me…I don’t know what it’s going to, but it’s going to be good. I don’t know, it’ll be great. We’re going to come up with something. In the meantime, please report that I said that I support Donald Trump 1,000%, and also that I am working to figure out how to clean up the giant, deliberate mess he is making of people’s lives and our economy in this state, for which I have a lot of empathy. Say that too, even though I definitely 1,000% support this infliction of pain on people who live in my state and even on myself, even though we’ve done nothing wrong. Can you get all that in the lede? Thank you sir, may I have another? Can you put that as the caption?
Did I mention that Virginia has elections this year in just a few months? You feel like your Republican politicians in Virginia are looking out for you? So we’re going to keep watching this dynamic. Republicans who can’t actually bear what Trump is doing to their own states and to their own constituents, but they’re too scared to say they’re against it…Republicans just eating it in their home districts and their home states as their party’s leader does things that are devastating to those states and to those constituents. And just seeing that in states all over the country is, is…a lot of thing; it gives me many, many feelings of many different kinds.
But as a matter of political science, it’s also important to watch in terms of what kinds of constraints this president, this administration might ever feel. Political scientists will tell you that one of the only constraints that matter on an ascending authoritarian is the constraints put on him by his own party. The distance between what people think they voted for and what people realize they got ultimately does matter. Sometimes it’s the only thing that matters. The Wall Street Journal yesterday spoke with Trump voters who just one month in, say they are now horrified by what they helped cause when they voted for Trump…
…So as long as we still have a political process, voters feeling that way, *Trump* voters feeling that way, Republican elected officials desperately seeking exemptions for their state from what Trump is doing to try to save their constituents from what Trump is doing, saying Trump’s policies are bad if they apply in their state. Republicans finding Trump’s actions and chaos and dysfunction not only damaging, but indefensible. And they’re being caught out at home, unable to defend the indefensible. If we still have a political process, that will matter in terms of what Trump can do and for how long.”
Check out the following press release from Abigail Spanberger, regarding the new data that finds Virginia ranking 51st (!) in math recovery between 2019 and 2024. As Spanberger says: “Virginians deserve a Governor who is committed to making our schools the best in America — and that means focusing on policies to develop math and reading skills, support public schools as they prepare our kids for a career or college, and address chronic teacher recruitment and retention challenges. Unfortunately, our current Governor has vetoed bipartisan efforts to more quickly bring Virginia up to the national average in teacher pay.”
Spanberger Statement on Virginia Schools Ranking Last in America in Math Recovery
According to the Education Recovery Scorecard, Virginia Ranked 51st in Math Recovery From 2019 to 2024
Spanberger: “Virginians Deserve a Governor Who is Committed to Making Our Schools the Best in America”
RICHMOND, Va. — Congresswoman Abigail Spanberger today released the following statement in response to Virginia ranking 51st in the country — behind all other states and Washington, D.C. — in math recovery from 2019 to 2024. These new rankings are based on students’ scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, often called the Nation’s Report Card.
“Virginians deserve a Governor who will do everything to make sure that children across our Commonwealth are not only meeting standards in math achievement and recovery, but are given the opportunity to excel. This new report makes clear that the current administration is not doing that.
“Virginians deserve a Governor who is committed to making our schools the best in America — and that means focusing on policies to develop math and reading skills, support public schools as they prepare our kids for a career or college, and address chronic teacher recruitment and retention challenges. Unfortunately, our current Governor has vetoed bipartisan efforts to more quickly bring Virginia up to the national average in teacher pay.
“I’m the mother of three daughters in Virginia public schools — one in elementary school, one in middle school, and one in high school, and I know that all Virginia parents want their kids to receive a high-quality education that puts them on the path to success. As Governor, I will work to make sure our school divisions, our schools, and our teachers have the funding and support staff they need to challenge our students and tackle learning loss — because I know that the success of Virginia’s next generation depends on the strength of our schools.”
BACKGROUND
Average student achievement in math remains almost a full grade below 2019 levels. Similarly, Virginia ranked 41st in the country in reading recovery from 2019 to 2024 — and average student achievement in reading remains almost three quarters of a grade level below 2019 levels.
The Education Recovery Scorecard analyzes students’ performance on the National Assessment of Educational Progress. According to the Virginia Department of Education, the National Assessment of Educational Progress is the largest nationally representative and continuing assessment of what students in public and private schools in the United States know and are able to do in various subjects. It is the only ongoing effort to obtain comprehensive and dependable achievement data on a national basis in a uniform and scientific manner.
