Republicans’ Failed Energy Record Is Losing Them the Midterms

To: Interested Parties
From: Seth Nelson, Evergreen Action Communications Director
Date: October 30, 2026
Re: Republicans’ Failed Energy Record Is Losing Them the Midterms

“‘President Trump is talking about all the money they’re making while people are suffering at the pump.’ That’ll be the headline. But I said, ‘I don’t give a damn. I’m gonna say it. We’re making a freaking fortune.’”

 

— President Donald Trump, Oct. 24, 2026

Talk about saying the quiet part out loud. Two years after Trump promised to cut energy bills in half, families are paying more at the pump and on every electric bill—and voters blame Republicans. His most vulnerable allies in Congress are running from a record that lands in their constituents’ mailboxes every month—a record that’s losing them the midterms.

Trump Promised To Cut Energy Costs In Half. Instead, Families Got Hit With Bigger Bills.

Nearly two years into his final term, everything Trump swore he’d make cheaper costs families more: electricity bills, heating bills, and a full tank of gas. 

Trump’s promise: “Within one year, you’re going to have electric bills and energy bills, and your gasoline for your car, it’s going to 5-0, 50% cheaper than it is right now.” He repeated that pledge nearly 50 times on the 2024 campaign trail.

The reality: Residential electricity prices are up 9.4% nationally over the past two years, and by double digits in states with some of the most competitive races for Congress.

Percent change in average residential electricity price, August 2024 to August 2026. Source: EIA, Electric Power Monthly, Table 5.6.A (2026; 2024)

And it’s getting worse: EIA forecasts wholesale power prices in PJM—the nation’s largest grid, serving 67 million people across 13 states and D.C., including Pennsylvania and New Jersey—will jump 41% this year, the largest increase in the country.

At the pump: As of October 26, gas averages $4.27 a gallon, up $1.33 (45%) since the week before Trump launched his war in Iran on February 28 and 41% from a year ago. Gas averaged $4 or more for 26 weeks this year—more than any year since EIA’s weekly records began in 1990.

Republicans Chose Their Oil And Gas Donors Over Lower Bills.

This wasn’t bad luck or a failure to deliver. It was a choice. Republicans doubled down on expensive, polluting oil and gas, blocked renewable energy projects that communities were counting on to deliver affordable power, and gutted federal clean energy investments to choke off the competition. 

Their oil and gas donors sure got their money’s worth. In 2024, Trump struck a clear quid pro quo with Big Oil, asking industry leaders to steer $1 billion to his campaign in exchange for delivering on its policy wish list, and the industry gave more than $24 million in direct contributions to Republican House and Senate candidates. Once in power, Trump and Republicans put boosting fossil fuel profits at the top of their agenda, no matter the cost to working people. Dozens of Republicans in the House and Senate even warned publicly that killing clean energy tax credits could bring “severe economic consequences.” Then they voted for Trump’s multi-trillion-dollar tax law that gutted those credits anyway.

Reps. Mike Lawler (NY-17), Tom Kean Jr. (NJ-7) and Rob Bresnahan (PA-8) voted for the megabill in the House, then signed a letter begging the Senate to scale back the clean energy cuts they just voted for. Weeks later, all three folded and voted for the final law that kept the cuts.

Donors over drivers: By protecting Big Oil at every turn, Republicans have left American families more exposed to oil shocks than anyone else around the world, and Trump’s war in Iran proves it. Americans have absorbed a third of the world’s added fuel costs since the war began—$160 billion, more than any other country. That’s $471 per person, nearly eight times the global average.

• Republicans’ tax law made it worse: Killing the $7,500 tax credit for new electric vehicles (EVs) also eliminated the best protection families have against oil shocks. U.S. EV drivers have paid just $17 more to charge since the war began. Yet with the credit gone, EV demand has stalled, American automakers like Ford have rolled back EV production, and only 7.3% of new cars sold in the U.S. through August this year were plug-ins, compared to 57% in China.

Trump Is Sabotaging Cheap, Clean Power, And Propping Up Fossil Fuels. Republicans Are Cheering Him On.

Republicans’ behemoth tax law was just one piece of the plan to dismantle cheap, clean power. Trump has made sabotaging wind and solar—the cheapest and fastest-to-build ways to meet skyrocketing demand and keep bills down—a central plank of his presidency. He has pulled every lever he can get his hands on to do it, and Republicans in Congress have egged him on.

Paying off companies to quit: Trump has paid off developers nearly $4 billion in taxpayer money to walk away from their offshore wind leases—and pour the vast majority of that cash into fossil fuels.

Punishing states that didn’t vote for him: Trump canceled $7.6 billion in clean energy grants for more than 200 projects, including in New York, New Jersey, and Maryland. His own administration admitted in court documents that it killed them “based solely on the political identity of the grant recipient’s state.”

The big coal bailout: Trump invoked the Defense Production Act to hand the coal industry $700 million in taxpayer money to build two new coal plants and extend the lives of 13 others—including restarting a shuttered Maryland plant. It’s a lifeline to an industry the market has already rejected: 99% of coal plants in the U.S. cost more to run than replacing them with new local solar, wind, or storage.

• Rep. Derrick Van Orden (WI-3) stood in the Oval Office alongside Trump for the announcement, then bragged that the handout would “lower costs for families.” It won’t. Propping up coal plants that cost more to run than cleaner alternatives doesn’t cut a single bill. But it does lock families into paying for some of the most expensive power on the grid.

Forcing old, costly coal plants to keep running: That bailout comes on top of more than two dozen “emergency” orders from Trump’s Department of Energy, blocking scheduled coal plant retirements. Take Michigan’s J.H. Campbell plant, for example. Retiring it was projected to save customers nearly $600 million. Instead, Trump’s orders have racked up $295 million in extra costs that the utility operating the plant is seeking to pass on to customers. Keeping every plant slated to retire through the end of Trump’s term open this way could cost customers more than $3 billion a year.

• Rep. Bill Huizenga (MI-4) cheered Trump’s abuse of emergency powers to keep Campbell, which sits in his district, running past its retirement date, leaving his constituents to foot the bill.

The consequences: Between Trump’s attacks and Republicans’ tax law, at least 216 major clean energy projects have been canceled, closed, or scaled back since he took office—including at least a dozen in Michigan and 20 in New York—wiping out $68 billion in private investment and 468,000 jobs those projects would have supported.

Voters Are Paying the Price, And They Know Who Sent The Bill.

Each of these choices lands on a family’s monthly bill, and the damage is staggering. One in six U.S. households is now behind on its utility bills, and Americans’ utility debt is on track to hit $23 billion by the end of this year, according to the National Energy Assistance Directors Association. The average household was expected to spend nearly $800 on electricity over the summer alone, up more than 10% from 2025. And voters are tracing every dollar straight back to Republicans:

• Trump’s energy price hikes are on the ballot, and voters are ready to pull the plug: In a survey of competitive U.S. House districts, the price at the pump (46%) and utility costs (37%) rank as voters’ top issues after groceries, and both have climbed in importance since May.

• They know who to blame: In the same poll, 60% of voters said Trump is making energy prices worse, and 54% said the same of Republicans in Congress.

• Voters once gave Republicans the benefit of the doubt on energy costs. Not anymore: In December 2024, just before Trump took office and a new Congress was sworn in, 42% of voters expected congressional Republicans to make energy prices better, while 35% expected they would make them worse. By May 2026, that had flipped. 58% now say they’re making prices worse and just 20% say better.

• Their playbook is a loser with swing voters: The moves Republicans backed are deeply unpopular in competitive House districts. 77% of voters oppose paying off companies to abandon offshore wind projects, 63% oppose Trump’s abuse of emergency powers to force coal plants to stay open, and 59% oppose cutting clean energy tax incentives. Among voters still undecided, opposition climbs to 88%, 75%, and 69%, respectively.

Grand Old Panic: Republicans Deny, Deflect, Peddle, and Flip-Flop.

Faced with skyrocketing energy costs they promised to cut, Republicans pretend the problem isn’t real, blame anyone but themselves, or flip-flop when the pressure is on.

Deny: Trump has spent nearly a full year insisting the cost of living crisis isn’t real. Days after the November 2025 elections, he called affordability “a con job by the Democrats,” and within a month he was calling it a “hoax.”

• With prices still climbing, he’s only doubled down. Less than three weeks before the election, he told a Georgia rally that affordability is “a word [Democrats] made up” and complained that “they’ve been hitting me with that word for the last year.” (For the record, Merriam-Webster traces “affordable” back to 1647. What’s new isn’t the word; it’s a president who refuses to take accountability for it.)

Deflect: Rep. Ryan Mackenzie (PA-7), who won his seat by just 4,000 votes in 2024, blames rising electricity costs on the previous administration—nearly two years into Trump’s term—and has faced tough town hall questions on gas prices. 

• Rep. Scott Perry (PA-10) insists that rising diesel costs have “nothing to do with Iran” (even though diesel exports from the Middle East have dropped sharply since Trump started the war), and is pitching a gas tax holiday instead.

Flip-flop: Mike Rogers, the Republican candidate for Michigan’s open U.S. Senate seat, reversed course and backed a statewide moratorium on data centers—days after new reporting revealed he holds millions in stock that could benefit from data centers’ rapid growth.

Running From Trump—and Their Own Record.

In the final stretch, Republicans are running from Trump on the trail and voting with him in Washington. But they cannot outrun their energy record. Ads hammering rising energy bills blanket the airwaves, and Republicans won’t even say the name of the law that helped drive those bills up.

Trump, erased: In May, nearly half (47%) of Republican ads mentioned Trump. So far in October, only 1% do, according to the advertising analytics firm AdImpact.

Their votes tell the truth: Republicans in the most competitive House races have voted with Trump a whopping 96% of the time this year, nearly the same rate as Republicans overall (97%).

• Many of the most vulnerable Republicans actually voted with Trump more often this year than they did last year—including Reps. Rob Bresnahan (PA-8), Ryan Mackenzie (PA-7), and Derrick Van Orden (WI-3)—despite the president’s historic unpopularity with voters. And Mackenzie and Van Orden have backed him on every single vote they’ve taken this year.

Energy bills are flooding the airwaves: More than $191 million in ads about utility and energy bills have aired this year, surging from $25.5 million in the first quarter to $138.5 million in the third, according to a Climate Power analysis of AdImpact data.

“Data Center Derrick” (and friends): New York’s 17th Congressional District, Wisconsin’s 3rd, and Pennsylvania’s 8th have each seen more than $1 million in ads about data centers driving up costs. In Wisconsin, ads brand incumbent Rep. Derrick Van Orden “Data Center Derrick.” 

–

Energy costs have emerged as one of the defining issues of this election, and Republicans’ failed record is likely to cost them the midterms.

Trump promised to cut energy bills in half. He and Republicans in Congress jacked them up instead. “I don’t give a damn,” says Trump. Well, voters do. No last-minute ad buy or musing about the legitimacy of the word “affordability” can hide the prices at the pump or what shows up in the mailbox every month: a bigger bill, and a reminder of who promised to cut it in half.

For more information or to speak with a policy expert, please contact Evergreen Action Communications Director Seth Nelson at seth@evergreenaction.com.

###