Thomas Catenacci of the Washington Free Beacon reports disturbing news emerging from a Biden Cabinet department.
Each time the Department of Energy (DOE) finalized regulations targeting popular home appliances—including stoves, clothes washers, refrigerators, and water heaters—over the last several months, the agency included a similar line in the announcement: The new rules were crafted with the help of recommendations from a “wide range of stakeholders.”
According to the DOE, the stakeholders included industry partners and consumer advocacy organizations. A Washington Free Beacon review, however, shows 7 out of the 10 stakeholders whose recommendations DOE consulted are climate activist groups or left-leaning consumer groups. Those groups collectively boast substantial financial backing from grantmaking nonprofits that regularly funnel money to a wide range of progressive social and environmental initiatives.
Among the stakeholders are the Consumer Federation of America, Appliance Standards Awareness Project, American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy, Earthjustice, National Consumer Law Center, National Resources Defense Council, and Consumer Reports. Those groups have received millions of dollars from nonprofits such as the Bloomberg Family Foundation, TomKat Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation, Hewlett Foundation, and Schmidt Family Foundation.
The revelation sheds light on how DOE ultimately welcomed the influence of far-left climate-focused interest groups while finalizing key government rulemakings, which, taken together, may cost Americans thousands of dollars when purchasing new appliances. And it appears to contradict any assertion that the regulations are the product of negotiations involving stakeholders across the ideological spectrum.
“If the agency is going to rely on these far-left groups, who have never met a regulation they didn’t like, the results are going to be obvious. And that’s what we are seeing,” Ben Lieberman, a senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, told the Free Beacon. “The reality of these negotiations is that the true interests of consumers never have a seat at the table.”
“These groups—they are really far, far left and are pushing a larger agenda that sacrifices consumers, rather than helping consumers, and I would include the so-called consumer groups. This is an anti-energy and climate change agenda that comes at the expense of consumers,” he continued.
