Senate Dems Block Bill To Keep Data-Center Costs Off Electric Bills
Sen. Jon Husted (R-OH) slammed Democrats for blocking a bill that would keep everyday Americans from paying exorbitant electricity bills caused by data centers
During a podcast interview with Matt Whitlock, the lawmaker explained that his Ratepayer Protection Act “would require data centers to build their own power infrastructure so that none of that cost is passed on to consumers.”
The House passed the measure 417 to three before Senate Democrats killed it.
“The president wants it, House Democrats and Republicans want it, consumers want it, the business community wants it, but Senate Democrats, when I tried to pass this last week, blocked it,” the senator said.
Husted continued, arguing that Democrats blocked the measure because they don’t want Republicans getting credit for passing it.
“I’m not shocked that Democrats would want to stop us from doing things to help the American people just for political gain on their part,” Husted said. “They didn’t want to see us have a win. They didn’t want to see us solve problems for the American people.”
Husted continued, saying Democrats “don’t want to see us solve the affordability problem.” He added, “So, guess who owns the affordability problem when it comes to electricity? It’s Democrats.”
Whitlock predicted Democrats would block the bill until after the midterm elections so Republicans wouldn’t benefit politically from the bill’s passage.
“One of the things that’s gonna be the most frustrating about this is I think there’s a very real chance that after this election season is passed, Democrats come back and probably overwhelmingly support this passing, but they want the issue right now for this season in time to stay on the minds of voters,” Whitlock said.
Husted agreed, saying Democrats “have made it a partisan issue because they’ve blocked it from becoming law” and that, “They don’t want a solution to get to President Trump’s desk so that any of us can say that we did something to help consumers. They want to hurt consumers for their perceived political gain.”
The Ratepayer Protection Act is a bipartisan bill that would require state public utility commissions to consider a federal standard under which large data centers that use 100 megawatts or more would pay the full extra cost of new power plants, transmission lines, and other grid upgrades built to fuel their facilities.
It would mean that households and small businesses would not be forced to foot the bill.
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