Tag: republicans

GOP Senators Present Evidence China Bankrolls Environmentalist Lawsuits To Cripple U.S. Power

Senators met yesterday for a subcommittee hearing to discuss claims that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), foreign donors, and leftist legal activism are behind a “systematic campaign” to dismantle American energy dominance.

Throughout the hearing, Chairman Ted Cruz, R-Texas, emphasized how foreign funding and activist litigation are undermining U.S. energy infrastructure, posing a national security threat. His four Democrat colleagues repeatedly dismissed the concerns as a “conspiracy theory,” instead focusing on energy costs and “global warming.”

The “assault by the radical left,” “paid for by the [CCP],” seeks to “seize control of our courts [and] to weaponize litigation against U.S. energy producers,” Cruz said. He noted the assault is “three-pronged,” weaponizing “foreign funding, mass litigation, and judicial indoctrination” against “American energy independence.”

In describing the first prong, Cruz highlighted a “strategic alliance … between leftist billionaires, radical environmental organizations, and the Chinese Communist Party.” He said, “One of the primary vehicles for this alliance is Energy Foundation China, which has funneled upwards of $12 million to U.S.-based climate advocacy groups since 2020.”

This money flows “directly to aggressive litigation outfits” that file lawsuits against American gas and oil companies, Cruz said. He later said the “second prong” of the assault is a “legal barrage” aimed at bankrupting such companies. Cruz said more than 30 lawsuits have been filed in “at least 15 Democratic-run jurisdictions, including by 12 states” against U.S. oil, gas, and coal producers.

Scott Walter, president of Capital Research Center, testified during the hearing. He said, “Many environmentalist groups funded by the multitude of left-wing billionaires have disturbing foreign ties,” citing big-money international players such as Neville Roy Singham.

Singham lives in Hong Kong and was investigated by the FBI in 1974 for being “potentially dangerous” because he engaged in “activities inimical to the U.S,” according to Influence Watch. Walter also highlighted Swiss billionaire Hansjörg Wyss, who spent $650 million on left-wing organizations, including “ClimateWorks Foundation, Earthjustice Legal Defense Fund, and Natural Resources Defense Council,” Walter’s testimony cites.

Climate lawfare groups suing American energy have raked in $500 million in 2023 from lawsuits, according to IRS forms Cruz cited during the hearing.

“They are using theories that are preposterous, legally speaking, and most of these theories will eventually hit a wall when they hit the final court,” Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach told The Federalist. Kobach said in his written testimony that some states have overstepped their bounds by “regulating conduct and industries far beyond their borders.”

Cruz said the “third prong” of the assault against American energy is “judicial capture,” primarily by the Environmental Law Institute (ELI), which holds “near total control over climate-related judicial training.” ELI’s Climate Judiciary Project (CJP) seeks “to ‘educate’—from a left-wing perspective—federal and state judges about climate change and related litigation designed to extract billions of dollars from energy companies,” Walter said in his written testimony.

The program claims to be nonpartisan but pressures judges into a specific “predetermined political narrative” and is funded by “left-wing bankrollers,” Cruz said. He said “more than 2,000 judges have participated” in the program.

“I’m skeptical that the CJP wants to help energy,” Walter said in response to a question from Cruz.

The four Democrat senators at the hearing unanimously wrote the CCP allegations off as a “conspiracy theory,” with Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Illinois, saying global warming is the real threat Congress should address. Witness David Arkush, the director of the Public Citizen’s Climate Program at the left-wing Roosevelt Institute, also dismissed the CCP allegations as “conspiracy theory.” Arkush told The Federalist, “I don’t see why [CCP] would be funding litigation against the U.S. oil and gas industry.”

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House Republican Introduces Bill to Increase Penalties for Spies Working for US Adversaries

Rep. Pat Harrigan (R-N.C.) has introduced new legislation that would mandate harsher prison terms for those responsible for carrying out espionage for America’s top adversaries, namely China, Iran, North Korea, and Russia.

Harrigan, who serves on the House’s Armed Services and Science, Space and Technology committees, introduced the Foreign Adversary Federal Offense (FAFO) Act (HR 4081), which would set a minimum prison sentence of 15 years for defense-related espionage and at least 10 years in prison without parole for economic espionage.

Corporations or other organizations found guilty of economic espionage would face a fine of $20 million or five times the value of the stolen trade secret.

“My FAFO Act is a direct response to the growing threat posed by foreign adversaries targeting the United States from within,” Harrigan said in a statement on June 24. “When individuals steal defense secrets or compromise our critical infrastructure on behalf of China, Russia, Iran, or North Korea, they are committing an act of betrayal against this country.

“This legislation ensures they face severe, unrelenting consequences. There will be no plea deals, no light sentences, and no path to parole. If you betray America, you will face the full weight of American justice.”

According to the bill, the penalties would be specific to those advancing the interests of a “covered nation” under a U.S. law restricting the Department of Defense’s procurement of sensitive materials from a list of foreign countries, including China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea.

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Mike Lee’s proposed public lands sale blocked by Senate parliamentarian

A proposal by Utah Sen. Mike Lee, a Republican, to sell millions of acres of public lands to private housing developers hit the skids late Monday when the Senate parliamentarian ruled it couldn’t be included in President Trump’s One Big, Beautiful Bill.

Why it matters: Lee’s plan would have ordered federal land managers to sell up to about 3.3 million acres of land for housing and infrastructure.

Driving the news: The Senate parliamentarian decided Monday night that Lee’s proposal violated rules limiting “extraneous” measures that can be added during budget reconciliation.

  • To overcome the ruling, Lee’s plan would require a 60-vote majority.

Catch up quick: Lee’s proposed land sale prompted widespread backlash, including from some Republicans.

  • Lee said the land sales would make room for more housing in western states — but the policy language didn’t require homes built on the land to meet any standard for affordability.

The intrigue: Shortly before the parliamentarian’s ruling, Lee posted to X that he planned to make major revisions to the proposal, making national forest land ineligible for sale and “significantly” reducing other lands that would be available.

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Marijuana Opponents ‘Have Lost’ The Debate, GOP Senator Says, Arguing ‘It’s Time’ To Regulate It Like Alcohol And Tobacco

A GOP senator says opponents of marijuana legalization “have lost” the fight to maintain prohibition and that “it’s time” for lawmakers to address that reality by creating a regulatory framework treating cannabis “in the same way that we do with alcohol and tobacco,” so that states can set their own policies without federal intervention.

During a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Tuesday that featured witnesses from the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) pressed the DEA representative on cannabis policy issues.

“I have tried to keep pounding the table and saying, ‘Folks, those of us who were not necessarily eager to legalize pot have lost,’” the senator said. “The majority of states have legalized it at some level or another. I don’t really have a whole lot of emotions about it personally, but for the fact that I don’t think we’re regulating it properly, and I do believe it’s just become another distribution channel for the cartels.”

Tillis seemed to be arguing that the absence of federal regulations, and the policy disconnect with states that have increasingly enacted legalization, has created a vacuum that’s allowed illicit operators to thrive.

“We’ve got to get this under control. We have to realize that pot is going to be legal in this country in one form or another, and virtually every other state,” he said. “We can either figure out how to regulate it by putting a U.S. Department of Agriculture regimen in [and] an [Food and Drug Administration, or FDA] regimen in the same way that we do with alcohol and tobacco are.”

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Map Shows Where 250 Million Acres of Public Land is Being Sold Off

The largest single sale of national public land in modern history could be carried out as part of President Donald Trump‘s budget bill to help pay for his sweeping tax cuts.

However, a professor who is an expert on climate policy questioned the efficacy of the proposals, telling Newsweek that “selling off public lands will not reduce federal spending to any significant degree.”

Newsweek has contacted the Bureau of Land Management and the U.S. Forest Service via email for comment.

Why It Matters

The Senate committee said that a lot of the land owned by BLM and USFS cannot be used for housing, and so by opening up portions of federal land for large-scale housing construction, they intend to solve the “housing crisis.”

However, the nonprofit land conversation organization The Wilderness Society argued the opposite—that research suggests “very little of the land managed by the BLM and USFS is actually suitable for housing.”

It warned that much of the public land eligible for sale in the bill include “local recreation areas, wilderness study areas, inventoried roadless areas, critical wildlife habitat and big game migration corridors.”

The organization said the measure “trades ordinary Americans’ access to outdoor recreation for a short-term payoff that disproportionately benefits the privileged and well-connected.”

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Texas medical marijuana companies spent big on Republican lobbyists to push THC ban

Gov. Greg Abbott has a choice when it comes to banning hemp-derived delta-8 and delta-9 THC products: listen to hundreds of thousands of Texans who enjoy them or a handful of powerful Republican lobbyists working for marijuana investors.

Abbott is in the crossfire of a cannabis civil war. Medical marijuana and retail hemp companies are fighting over who can legally get people high. The standoff is typical Texas politics, with the medical marijuana companies hiring former aides to Abbott and Lt. Gov Dan Patrick to lobby for them, and the hemp industry relying on public pressure.

The Texas Legislature authorized medical marijuana in 2017 for a tiny number of patients. Three medical cannabis companies have spent millions complying with the Texas Compassionate Use Program to legally sell products with THC, the ingredient in marijuana that makes you high. They expected exclusivity. Since then, lawmakers have steadily expanded TCUP to treat more conditions, adding people with chronic pain this year.

In 2021, cannabis-focused venture capital firm AFI Capital Partners led a $21 million Series B investment in Texas Original Compassionate Cultivation. The company supplied 77% of the medical cannabis consumed in 2022, the latest full-year data available in an annual Texas Department of Public Safety TCUP analysis.

The investment had horrible timing. In 2019, federal and state lawmakers legalized hemp, a type of cannabis with low levels of THC. Hemp entrepreneurs figured out how to concentrate the THC, and today, the hemp industry primarily sells edibles containing enough THC to get you stoned.

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Ohio Republicans Introduce ‘Prenatal Equal Protection Act’ to Abolish Abortion in the State

Ohio State Representatives Levi Dean and Johnathan Newman have filed a bill to abolish abortion in the state by granting pre-born babies equal protection under the law.

The Ohio Prenatal Equal Protection Act, House Bill 370, points to the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which states “no state shall deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws’ to protect the life of preborn persons.”

“This bill recognizes that we are a country and state governed by laws, and that our laws must be constitutional,” Rep. Newman said in a press release. “Article I, Section 22 of Ohio’s Constitution, which was adopted by popular vote in 2023, has created an obvious conflict between the Ohio Constitution and U.S. Constitution.”

“We have a mandate from God to protect human life, which is of higher authority than any constitution,” Newman said. “Proverbs 24:11 commands us to ‘rescue those who are being carried off to death.’ Proverbs 17:15 says it is an ‘abomination’ to God for those who are guilty of doing harm to be called innocent.”

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Ohio GOP Lawmakers Can’t Agree On How To Amend Marijuana Law, Causing Planned Vote To Be Canceled

Despite efforts in the Ohio legislature to pass a bill to significantly change the state’s voter-approved marijuana law, last-minute disagreements between the House and Senate Republicans seemed to have derailed that plan for now—with House lawmakers signaling that a deal won’t be struck before the summer recess.

After taking public testimony and adopting certain changes to the Senate-passed legislation, SB 56, in recent weeks, the House Judiciary Committee ultimately declined to advance the proposal as scheduled at a Wednesday hearing, making it so the measure couldn’t advance to a floor vote planned for that day. Evidently, the revisions didn’t sit well with key senators, according to several legislators.

“Apparently the Senate changed their mind,” Rep. Jamie Callender (R), a pro-legalization lawmaker, told News 5 Cleveland.

Changes approved at a hearing late last month, for example, rolled back some of the strict limits included in a version of the measure passed by the Senate in February, including a criminal prohibition on sharing marijuana between adults on private property.

“They wanted to make a mandatory jail sentence for passing a joint between friends,” Callender, who has spent weeks working on additional changes to the legislation, said. He also complained about the Senate’s proposal to put all cannabis tax revenue in the state’s general fund, which would have prevented local municipalities from getting a share of those dollars as is currently the law.

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Ivy League Researchers Scaremonger About GOP Health Policy But Say Nothing About Similar Democrat Plans

Ivy League faculty members have a leftist bias — would you believe it?

That sarcastic conclusion comes from the latest example of rhetorical scaremongering over the budget reconciliation bill being considered by Congress. When Republican lawmakers decide to scale back health care benefits, the professoriate loudly proclaims that people in their legions will die. But when Democrat lawmakers do the same thing, these same commentators decide to join the Witness Protection Program.

Deaths Metric

On June 3, a series of researchers affiliated with the University of Pennsylvania’s Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics and the Yale School of Public Health released a letter regarding the House-passed budget reconciliation bill. In it, they claimed that several specific provisions in the bill “would result in more than 42,500 deaths annually.” They further claimed that allowing enhanced Obamacare subsidies to expire at year’s end, as they are scheduled to do under current law, “will cause an additional 8,811 deaths,” meaning that “altogether, we project that these changes will result in over 51,000 preventable deaths.”

The letter leaves much to unpack. For starters, the idea that anyone can know with any level of certainty the precise number of deaths attributable to a specific policy — not 8,810 or 8,812, mind you, but exactly 8,811 — is absurd on its face. If the researchers know the specific number of people who will die due to one policy change, then why not tell us the names of said individuals, and where, when, and how those people will die, while they’re at it?

Second, the expiration of the enhanced subsidies at year’s end comes because of Democrats, not Republicans. When they controlled Congress and the presidency, Democrats passed provisions letting these subsidies expire. Democrats fully expected future Congresses to extend them but wanted to try to disguise their true cost, just like they tried to hide the full $5 trillion cost of the failed Build Back Bankrupt legislation. They should neither complain nor blame Republicans for not wanting to fix or extend Democrats’ bad law. (The same applies to Republicans when it comes to tax gimmicks they might include in reconciliation.)

Ideological Bias

But the real “tell” regarding this letter comes in the form of a question the researchers didn’t answer. I emailed the lead authors, Rachel Werner at Penn and Alison Galvani from Yale, with a simple question: “Do you plan on conducting similar analyses on the number of deaths associated with Gov. [Gavin] Newsom’s proposal to freeze enrollment of undocumented immigrants in MediCal, and charge existing undocumented enrollees a $100 monthly premium? Why or why not?”

Astute readers may not be surprised to learn that, even after following up, I received nary an acknowledgement, let alone a reply. The researchers might claim they never received my message or that they only published their letter in response to a request from Sens. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., for an analysis of the effects of the reconciliation bill. (Any Republican lawmakers in California reading this should please — please — ask the researchers for the type of analysis I requested, if only to highlight their hypocrisy.)

But it doesn’t take a Ph.D. in economics to recognize the real reason for the disparate treatment. The letter was a headline — “Republican bill will kill X people per year!” — in search of a story and a justification. That’s why Wyden and Sanders requested it, and that’s why the researchers gladly complied. But when it comes to attacking Newsom, or Democrat Govs. J.B. Pritzker of Illinois or Tim Walz of Minnesota, all of whom have proposed scaling back taxpayer-funded coverage of illegal immigrants — not because they believe such benefits should go only to citizens, mind you, but because of skyrocketing costs — they suddenly become mute.

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Josh Hawley Wants To Raise the Minimum Wage

Sen. Josh Hawley (R–Mo.) has introduced a bill to increase the federal minimum wage, which has been $7.25 an hour since 2008. Hawley wants it to be $15 an hour. Many of us thought that the minimum wage issue was settled, but here we are again.

This is freshman-level economics: If you introduce a price floor on labor, the supply of people willing to work at that wage will exceed the demand, resulting in unemployment. If an employer can either have three employees making $10 an hour or two at $15 an hour (and one on public assistance), which do you think he would choose? Politicians like Hawley seem to think companies will simply accept lower profit margins. But they won’t—they’ll raise prices, cut staff, or go out of business.

Since hardly anyone earns $7.25 an hour these days, the federal minimum wage doesn’t cause serious economic distortion. A $15 mandate, by contrast, would wreak havoc, especially in low-cost-of-living areas. A simple thought experiment would be to imagine what would happen if we had a $10,000-an-hour minimum wage. This would obviously eliminate most jobs. The same principle applies to smaller hikes, even if the effects would not be as drastic. If prosperity could be legislated, we would have done it long ago.

Hawley is an interesting mix: socially conservative, economically populist. He has supported tax hikes on the rich, expanding the power of unions, capping credit card interest rates, expanding Social Security, imposing tariffs, and imposing prescription drug price controls. He’s frequently on the same side as such left-wing figures as Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D–Mass.) and Bernie Sanders (I–Vt.). In fact, he and Sanders, a self-described socialist, co-sponsored the bill to cap credit card interest rates.

What does it mean to be a Republican these days? What defines Republican economics? It used to be lower taxes or balanced budgets, but no longer. The Democrats are getting a lot of mileage out of being anti-tariffs, but that’s not because they are philosophically committed to free trade—most of them are reflexively opposing Trump. If a Democrat is elected in 2028, there’s a good chance they’ll maintain his tariffs. Voters don’t have many free market choices remaining.

We are a long way from 2005, when President George W. Bush and Treasury Secretary John Snow made an honest attempt at privatizing Social Security, or from 1998, when President Bill Clinton was pondering a bipartisan move along similar lines.

The camera loves Hawley; he’s handsome, articulate, and dangerous. When it comes to economics, there isn’t much daylight between him and the furthest-left factions of the Democratic Party. It is all about the packaging. If Hawley seems less crazy to the average voter than Warren and Bernie, that should worry us all.

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