If Democrat Policies Make Energy So Affordable, Why Are They Backtracking From Them?
This story and a smashing reception for Blue States, High Rates
Success for Blue States High Rates
The launch of our Blue States High Rates report has been a smashing success.
Our map was used in speeches by Congresswoman Julie Fedorchak (R-ND) in support of H.R. 3632, the Power Plant Reliability Act, and Congressman Troy Balderson (R-OH) in support of H.R. 3616, the Reliable Power Act. Both of these bills passed in the House.
Furthermore, the report’s talking points were echoed by Energy Secretary Chris Wright and the Executive Director of the Energy Dominance Council, Jarrod Age,n in interviews on Fox News and Axios, respectively.
We are incredibly grateful that our work has received so much positive attention from policymakers, and we are eager to continue the project by completing our analysis of the factors influencing electricity prices in each state and presenting the data with engaging visuals on an interactive website.
If you’d like to support this work, please consider donating here.
Now, for the rest of the story, most of which recently appeared in The Hill.
If Democrat Policies Make Energy So Affordable, Why Are They Backtracking From Them?
Recent victories by Democratic gubernatorial candidates in New Jersey and Virginia and for seats on the Georgia Public Service Commission have led outlets like Politico to brand the outcomes as the “electricity election.” And nationally, Democrats appear eager to seize on voter discontent over high power bills to position themselves as the champions of electricity affordability heading into the 2026 midterm elections.
Back in September, we predicted that mainstream media outlets would attempt to turn electricity prices into the new egg prices. On December 1st, the New York Times published this article:
But this newfound energetic electoral enthusiasm raises the question: If the energy and climate policies enacted by Democrats make energy so affordable, why are they retreating from them?
Take New York, where Governor Kathy Hochul (D) delayed implementing the state’s cap-and-tax mandates under the 2019 climate law. The law seeks to reduce statewide carbon dioxide emissions by 40 percent by 2030. Furthermore, the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act requires the state to produce 70 percent of its electricity from renewable sources by 2030 and 100 percent by 2040. When it passed, it was hailed by former Vice President Al Gore as “the most well-crafted” environmental legislation.
Yet New York is nowhere near to meeting its goals. Renewables — including not only wind and solar but conventional hydroelectric as well — made up only 23.2 percent of the state’s generation in July 2025 — only three percentage points higher than the U.S. average. New York’s residential electricity prices, meanwhile, were 50 percent higher than the U.S. average in July, and the state’s grid operator has warned of rising reliability risks over the next five years.
New York’s Department of Environmental Conservation has said implementing the regulations now would be “infeasible,” because it would impose “extraordinary and damaging costs upon New Yorkers.” Hochul has said as much herself, stating in an interview that the state’s goals must happen “in a time frame that’s not going to hurt ratepayers, so we’re slowing things down.” She also wants to “make sure that I’m not doing something that’s going to drive up costs for consumers, and the data shows at this time it would.”
In 2023, Hochul had even proposed authorizing $1 billion in “climate action rebates,” to New Yorkers — to offset the impacts on ratepayers if the law is fully implemented.
Hochul has also further retreated from expensive climate orthodoxy by approving two major natural gas pipelines and delaying implementation of New York’s All-Electric Buildings Act, which bans gas stoves in new buildings.
New York is not unique — in fact, examples abound.
Massachusetts state Rep. Mark Cusack (D), has introduced a bill to make his state’s onerous 2030 emissions target non-binding. “I have not found anyone who says that we are going to make our mandates,” Cusack acknowledged. Pennsylvania, with the agreement of Gov. Josh Shapiro (D), is leaving the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. In Colorado, Xcel Energy and the Public Utilities Commission have received permission to run a coal plant past its scheduled retirement date.
Even California is getting in on the action, paving the way for more oil drilling in Kern County and delaying a plan to penalize oil companies for high refinery profits. This is despite Gov. Gavin Newsom’s (D) appeals to the progressive environmental left through stunts such as attending United Nations climate talks.
The Democrats’ climate backtracking in some of America’s bluest states is a tacit — and in Hochul’s case, not-so-tacit — admission that these policies make energy more expensive for families and businesses, prioritizing climate mandates over affordability.
Federal data suggest there will be more opportunities for blue-state climate clawbacks in the future. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, the ten states in the continental U.S. with the highest electricity prices are reliably Democratic. In fact, 86 percent of states with electricity prices above the national average are reliably Democratic. The remaining 15 percent are considered “purple states.”
In contrast, of the ten states with the lowest electricity prices in the country, eight vote reliably red. In total, 71 percent of the states with electricity prices below the national average are red states. This shows that the electricity affordability divide is highly partisan and driven by state energy policies.
Energy affordability will be under the microscope during the 2026 midterms. Given soaring electricity prices in their respective states and obvious Democratic backtracking to contain skyrocketing costs, progressive policymakers may want to be careful about making power prices a central focus on their midterm campaigns, lest they remind voters who put them in this unaffordable situation in the first place.
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Resource Adequacy and the Energy Transition in the Pacific Northwest: Phase 1 Results Play Stupid Games, Win Stupid Prizes, Washington Edition.
Hochul and others are sticking to the story that wind and solar 1) are cheap and 2) create jobs (wonderful jobs). They’re not acknowledging that any specific policy is unaffordable, impractical, or utterly infeasible.
Meanwhile, they just approved a state energy plan that their own figures show will increase costs for moderate-income upstate households by nearly $600/mo. over conventional fuel use under a high-electrification scenario. That doesn’t take into account utility-initiated rate increases. They’re celebrating their “all of the above” fuel approach on the one hand while quietly sticking with those Climate Act mandates on the other. I believe this is called gaslighting.
Hochul’s hardcore support comes from urban downstate households whose energy use and costs are relatively modest, especially among those who don’t own vehicles. In contrast, upstate households (especially rural ones) require far more energy for housing and transportation. Commutes are longer, residences are mostly single-family, and winters are colder. The former don’t seem to understand or appreciate these differences—and the political class has no interest in them.
It is deeply ironic that California, having driven most of their refining capacity to close, is now pushing for more crude oil production that they will be unable to convert to gasoline. If only so many people did not suffer from the ignorance and idiocy of politicians!