To: Interested Parties
From: Evergreen Action Communications Director Seth Nelson
Date: April 22, 2026
Re: Scorched Earth Day: Trump’s Energy Price Hike Fuels Record Profits for Big Oil, Record Bills for Working Families
The first Earth Day in 1970 brought 20 million Americans into the streets to demand reforms protecting human health and the environment. Congress answered by establishing the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and passing the Clean Air Act within the year. On the 46th Earth Day, world leaders from 175 countries—including the United States—signed the Paris Climate Agreement.
This Earth Day, all that progress is under direct assault—and the American people are paying the price. On his first day back in office, Donald Trump pulled the U.S. out of the Paris Agreement. In the fifteen months since, he has waged an all-out war on clean energy—blocking the deployment of the cheapest, fastest-to-build new energy sources, abandoning the EPA’s core mission to protect human health and the environment, and systematically dismantling the tools that would deliver cheaper, cleaner power to American homes. The result: working families pay more, his Big Oil donors pocket record profits, and our science-backed climate goals slip further out of reach.
The numbers speak for themselves. Residential electricity prices are up 9.5% percent year over year—according to the Trump administration’s own data. The average household paid $537 more for electricity last year than Trump promised. Hundreds of millions of Americans have faced at least $93 million in electric and natural gas rate hikes since he took office. And now, Trump’s reckless, illegal war in Iran has sent gas prices soaring in a matter of weeks, with no quick relief in sight.
Meanwhile, Trump is transforming the federal government into a full-blown polluter protection racket for his Big Oil allies. He approved BP’s $5 billion ultra-deepwater oil drilling project in the Gulf of Mexico—a new oilfield from the company responsible for the worst oil spill in U.S. history—over the objections of members of Congress who called it an “unacceptable threat to Gulf communities, ecosystems, and the climate.” He invoked emergency powers to restart a California offshore oil pipeline that had been shuttered since a 2015 spill, overriding state law and court orders. He paid a nearly $1 billion taxpayer-funded bribe to a French energy company to abandon its offshore wind leases and reinvest the money into fossil fuels. And as his war drives oil and gas prices higher, Trump authorized an LNG exporter to immediately ramp up export capacity—adding to the industry’s recent “windfall in profits” while saddling domestic consumers with even higher bills by sending energy abroad.
Despite Trump’s insistence that gas prices “aren’t very high,” the American people aren’t buying it—a Quinnipiac poll last week found that the vast majority of voters blame him directly for the surge. The numbers, the polls, and the pump all tell the same story. Below is a breakdown of the new actions Trump has taken since our last update that are hiking Americans’ energy costs even further:
Trump’s Energy Price Hike: An Updated Timeline
April 19: Energy Secretary Wright admits gas prices won’t return below $3 a gallon until next year as Trump’s chaotic, illegal war in Iran drives energy prices higher with no end in sight
Action: Department of Energy (DOE) Secretary Chris Wright told CNN that gas prices below $3 gallon “might not happen until next year,” directly contradicting Trump’s repeated claims that prices would “come tumbling down” as soon as the conflict ended. One day later, Trump publicly called his own Energy Secretary “totally wrong.” The war, which Trump initially predicted would last four to six weeks, has now entered its seventh week with peace talks collapsed and no clear path to resolution.
Impact: The public contradiction between Trump and his own Energy Secretary tells the whole story: this administration’s energy policy is chaos, and working families are paying for it. Secretary Wright acknowledged what experts have been saying all along: this illegal war has created an energy price shock that won’t simply vanish when the fighting stops. The Strait of Hormuz remains effectively shut down, a disruption that experts say is the biggest in history and one that cannot be resolved until the Strait is fully reopened. “I don’t think there is any going back to sub-$3 a gallon for a while,” Moody’s Chief Economist Mark Zandi told CBS News. “Prices go up like a rocket, and they come down like a feather.” American households have already absorbed an average of $129 more at the pump since the war began. Every week this drags on, that number grows, and working families are the ones paying for a crisis entirely of Trump’s making.
April 8: The Pentagon ignores requested deadline for routine military reviews needed by dozens of wind projects
Action: More than 30 onshore wind farms across the country have been stalled as the Department of Defense sits on military radar clearance reviews that were once considered routine formalities. The American Clean Power Association asked the Pentagon to respond by April 8 to questions about the growing backlog, but the administration let the deadline pass without action, leaving developers in legal and financial limbo.
Impact: The Pentagon’s review backlog represents enough electricity to power several major cities. Onshore wind is among the cheapest, fastest-to-deploy new energy sources available. But the Pentagon’s deliberate inaction appears to be yet another weapon in Trump’s all-of-government war on wind power, blocking affordable supply from coming online just as electricity demand—and household bills—are surging. Meanwhile, wind development on federal public lands has been effectively frozen, with Interior Secretary Burgum requiring his personal sign-off on every permitting step—and approving none. While a recent legal decision has paused this illegal order, every delay keeping affordable power stuck in limbo means even higher bills for families.
April 3: Trump’s budget axes more than $15 billion in clean energy and EV investments while his illegal war sends energy prices soaring
Action: Trump’s fiscal year 2027 budget proposal would cancel more than $15 billion in Department of Energy (DOE) investments, eliminate $4 billion in electric vehicle (EV) charging infrastructure funding, and wipe out the Department of the Interior (DOI) staff responsible for processing clean energy permits on federal lands.
Impact: Trump’s proposal cancels billions in investments that would help American families escape gasoline dependency by putting more affordable EVs and charging infrastructure within reach. This is happening as his own military escalation in Iran is spiking global oil and gas prices, compounding the damage to working families. And at a moment when we desperately need more solar, wind, and battery storage on the grid, Trump wants to eliminate the very people responsible for approving those projects. Every permit that doesn’t get processed is another clean energy project that doesn’t get built, another utility that cannot affordably meet demand, and another price hike passed on to consumers. Trump is squeezing Americans at the pump and the thermostat with one hand while eliminating the very tools that could free them from reliance on expensive fossil fuels with the other.
April 3: Trump is holding up critical LIHEAP funds while again proposing to cut the program entirely
Action: Despite Congress appropriating nearly $4.5 billion for the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) in fiscal year 2026, the Trump administration is withholding more than $400 million in remaining funds from states. When asked by E&E News why the administration was holding back funds, the White House refused to answer and instead, without evidence, accused the program of being “rife with fraud.” While holding up the critical funds Congress had already appropriated, Trump again proposed cutting the LIHEAP program entirely in his fiscal year 2027 budget.
Impact: LIHEAP helps nearly 7 million Americans afford to heat and cool their homes each year. By sitting on congressionally-mandated funds at the precise moment his own policies are driving energy costs higher, Trump is engineering a crisis for families who can least afford it. The pattern is deliberate. Fire the LIHEAP staff (as he did in April 2025), propose cutting the program, withhold the money Congress provided, and leave vulnerable Americans to absorb the blow.
March 30: Trump’s DOE again abuses emergency authority to keep a Colorado coal plant alive past its retirement date, piling costs onto ratepayers
Action: Trump’s DOE extended its order forcing a Colorado coal plant to stay open through at least June 2026—six months past its planned December retirement—claiming the extension was needed to “maintain access to affordable, reliable” electricity. State regulators directly dispute that claim. Rigorous resource planning process required by the state’s Public Utilities Commission found that replacing the aging coal plant with other local power sources would cost less, and regulators ultimately concluded the plant is “not required for reliability or resource adequacy purposes.”
Impact: The Colorado extension is the latest charge on a $235 million bill that Trump’s abuse of emergency authority to keep six retiring fossil fuel plants alive has already handed ratepayers nationwide. Operating the Colorado plant rather than closing it as planned could cost more than $85 million annually—and the plant has yet to actually generate a single joule of energy, undercutting the administration’s own justification. Meanwhile, the plant’s co-owners had already purchased a solar facility to replace it. But if the coal plant is forced to run, limited regional transmission capacity means that cheaper, cleaner power wouldn’t reach customers: a “double-whammy” of higher costs and dirtier air, and the loss of the cheap, clean energy that was supposed to replace it. “This ridiculous order […is] delaying investment in new, lower cost energy projects that have been previously planned,” Governor Jared Polis said after the state filed an appeal. “The Trump administration has doubled down on an order that no one seems to want except the coal industry,” said Earthjustice attorney Leslie Coleman. That reality hasn’t stopped Trump from forcing Americans to pay more so the aging coal barons of a dying industry can profit.
March 24: Trump’s Interior Department blows past the congressionally-mandated deadline to report its progress on reviewing and permitting energy projects, including solar and wind
Action: The DOI failed to submit two required reports to Congress by a legally mandated deadline designed to hold the administration accountable for its progress in reviewing and approving energy projects on federal lands, including solar and wind development. Democrats secured the reporting requirement in the appropriations process specifically because they suspected the administration was deliberately stonewalling clean energy projects.
Impact: The missed deadline reflects a broader reality: the Trump administration has imposed a “nearly complete moratorium” on permitting renewable projects that DOI touches, on public and private land, ”no matter how minor.” A survey of 50 clean energy developers found nearly every company facing significant delays—the result of Interior Secretary Doug Burgum conducting what amounts to a personal political review of virtually every wind and solar project. That process has created a bureaucratic bottleneck clearly designed to grind clean energy approvals to a halt. While DOI has recently moved a handful of solar projects forward, and a federal judge has recently intervened, wind development remains essentially frozen, keeping cheap, faster-to-build energy from coming online just as demand surges. By refusing to even account for its own permitting decisions, the Trump administration is evading the transparency Congress mandated. And Americans are paying for it.
March 23: Trump administration announces a billion-dollar bribe to kill cheap wind power and subsidize fossil fuels
Action: The Trump administration announced a nearly $1 billion payout to TotalEnergies to cancel the company’s offshore wind leases off New York and North Carolina. In exchange, the company agreed to redirect those funds to oil and natural gas production, including liquefied natural gas (LNG).
Impact: After repeatedly losing in court on his illegal stop-work orders, Trump found another way to strangle offshore wind: bribe companies to walk away. His nakedly political campaign to kill the industry is working—and Americans will pay for it. Less clean energy coming online as demand surges means higher bills. Worse, the deal funnels more money into LNG exports, deepening Americans’ exposure to the volatile global prices Trump’s illegal war in Iran is already sending through the roof. The Financial Times later reported that DOI is pursuing similar taxpayer-funded bribes with other companies holding offshore wind leases. Trump is dismantling the homegrown clean energy that could shield Americans from fossil fuel volatility, while doubling down on the foreign markets his own foreign policy is destabilizing. And it’s working families who will pay the price.
March 14: Trump illegally overrides California state law to force a shuttered offshore oil pipeline to restart operations
Action: Invoking the Defense Production Act, Trump ordered the restart of the Sable Offshore pipeline off the coast of California—a facility shuttered since a 2015 oil spill that fouled miles of coastline and killed wildlife across the region. The move directly overrides California state law and federalism, as well as court orders that had blocked the pipeline’s restart, in a now-familiar assertion of federal power over state authority.
Impact: California Attorney General Rob Bonta rejected Trump’s justification outright, calling the move “an attempt to override California regulators and court orders” to benefit oil interests. The state filed suit, arguing the administration overstepped its authority under the Defense Production Act. While the administration claims the action is necessary to lower gas prices, experts dispute that restarting the pipeline would have any meaningful impact on fuel costs—especially when Trump’s military action in Iran has driven prices higher. “He’s using this crisis of his own making to attempt what he’s wanted to do for years: open California’s coast for his oil industry friends so they can poison our beaches,” California Governor Newsom said. And you can see why a president who started an illegal war that’s making his Big Oil donors rich would abuse his power to greenlight even more domestic drilling: oil and gas companies are pocketing more than $30 million every hour in just the first month of his war. Meanwhile, American households have already paid billions more in energy costs due to higher gas prices.
March 12: Trump’s Department of Transportation sues California in an attempt to overturn the state’s vehicle pollution standards that save families money
Action: Trump’s Department of Transportation (DOT) filed a lawsuit against California in an attempt to block the state’s ability to enforce its current vehicle pollution standards and its ability to set future ones.
Impact: California’s vehicle pollution standards have driven national progress on cheaper, cleaner cars for decades—and with good reason. Cleaner, more efficient vehicles save families hundreds of dollars at the pump every year, reduce dangerous local pollution, and cut the climate pollution driving up health risks and energy costs nationwide. Rolling back those standards would leave drivers with fewer options and less efficient vehicles that are more expensive to fuel, maintain, and repair. And the damage wouldn’t be confined to California: 17 states follow California’s standards, covering a third of the nation’s auto market. With Trump’s war in Iran already sending prices soaring, attacking a proven path to reducing Americans’ dependence on expensive gasoline couldn’t come at a worse time. If successful, the lawsuit would raise costs for drivers nationwide and lock them into gasoline dependence for years to come.
March 4: Trump holds a Big Tech photo op to sign an unenforceable data center cost pledge
Action: Trump gathered Big Tech executives at the White House to sign a voluntary, unenforceable agreement he claims will curb rising energy prices from data center expansion. After a roundtable of one-on-one flattery for the president, each Big Tech executive signed the pledge.
Impact: The pledge has no enforcement mechanisms, and ratepayers have no way to verify what’s actually agreed to when these companies cut deals with utilities. Nor does it inspire confidence: Big Tech has a well-documented history of announcing lofty targets and quietly abandoning them. The stunt won’t bring down prices. Trump’s pressure campaign to power data centers with expensive, polluting coal and gas plants will drive bills higher—as will his sabotage of wind, solar, and battery storage—the cheapest, fastest-to-build sources of new electricity available. A recent analysis from the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas makes the stakes plain. “Even a modest data center boom could substantially raise retail electricity prices and […] inflation,” it warns, adding that slower wind and solar growth “could nearly double the inflationary effect.” A voluntary pledge signed while Trump attacks the cheapest energy options on the market is worth less than the paper it’s printed on.
The Price of Trump’s Scorched Earth Agenda
The cheapest, fastest-to-build source of new electricity in America today is clean energy. It creates good jobs, cuts dangerous pollution, and shields families from exactly the kind of fossil fuel volatility Trump’s own policies are making worse. There is no tension between a cleaner future and lower energy bills. Trump’s war on clean energy is costing us both.
Donald Trump knows this—his own words give him away. As gas prices spiked last month, he posted on Truth Social that “when oil prices go up, we make a lot of money.” Not you. We. That “we” is Trump and his Big Oil allies—like Chevron’s CEO, who pocketed $104 million selling the company’s own stock while the U.S. was bombing Iran. His agenda was never about lowering energy prices for working families. It was always about enriching the fossil fuel industry at their expense.
This Earth Day, Americans are paying the price—at the pump, on their utility bills, and in the slow erosion of a future powered by cheap, clean energy. That’s what Trump has taken from us.
For more information or to speak with a policy expert, please contact Evergreen Action Communications Director Seth Nelson at seth@evergreenaction.com.