The Trump administration said Wednesday it would cut billions of dollars in funding for democratic state energy projects, including California’s massive efforts to develop clean hydrogen energy.
“Nearly $8 billion in green fraud funds to fuel the climate agenda on the left have been cancelled,” said Russell Vought, director of the White House Office of Management and Budget.
“The project is in the following states: CA, CO, CT, DE, HI, IL, MD, MA, MN, NH, NJ, NM, NY, OR, VT, WA,” Vought said.
All 16 states listed did not vote for Trump in the 2024 election.
In a news release, the Department of Energy confirmed that it has concluded more than 300 financial awards related to 223 projects, worth $7.56 billion. The department did not specify a name or location for the project, but said the awards were issued by multiple offices, including the Clean Energy Demonstration office and Office Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.
California officials said the renewable clean hydrogen energy system, or the alliance for arches, is one of the cuts. The Hub received a $1.2 billion federal grant from the Biden administration as part of a highly competitive national effort to develop hydrogen projects that replace planet-warming fossil fuels.
The announcement comes days after the energy sector said it was increasing production of fossil fuels. This opened 13 million acres of federal land and provided $625 million to recommend or modernize coal-fired power plants.
“In Trump’s America, energy policy is set by limiting the highest bidder, economics and common sense,” Gov. Gavin Newsom said in a statement. “Clean hydrogen deserves to be part of California’s energy future. It creates new jobs for hundreds of thousands and saves billions of health costs. We will continue to pursue all the above clean energy strategies that drive our future and purify the air, even if DC tries to direct it.”
According to the Energy sector, the project was cancelled following a review that determined that it “does not properly advance the country’s energy needs, is not economically viable, and does not provide a positive return on taxpayer dollar investments.”
Approximately a quarter of the awards were issued by the Biden administration between Election Day in November and Trump’s inauguration in January, the agency said.
California Sen. Adam Schiff said the cancellation amounted to political retaliation.
“When the president can illegally halt blue state projects to punish political enemies, our democracy is grossly broken,” Schiff said. “They continue to break the law and hope we will go together. Hell no.”
Rep. Rosa Delauro (D-Conn.) described the move as “purely vindictive,” and said it would bring higher energy prices across the country.
“The end of a critical energy project in a democratic state will merely weaponize political revenge policies, promote energy bills high, increase unemployment and eliminate jobs,” Delauro said in a statement. “It’s reckless and betrays both common sense and public trust.”
California and other states on Vought’s list are working to advance clean energy projects such as solar power. Republican countries working on similar efforts, such as Texas, the largest producer of wind energy in the United States, were not one of Vought’s cut lists from the Department of Energy.
The Arch was one of seven regional hydrogen capacity hubs that the Biden administration awarded funds. Others were in the Mid-Atlantic, Pacific Northwest, Midwest, Appalachia and Texas, with the “Heartland” hubs spread across Minnesota, North Dakota and South Dakota. It was not immediately clear whether other democratic hubs were one of Wednesday’s cuts. Arches has also raised more than $10 billion in private funding agreements.
“Bringing away from the arches threatens the future promise of hydrogen energy, energy costs continue to rise for families, and other worlds continue to move forward in their development,” Sen. Alex Padilla (D – Calif.) said in a statement.
Vought, one of the authors of the Conservative Platform Document Project 2025, is actively involved in reshaping the federal government during the second Trump administration. On Wednesday, the US Department of Transportation prevented it from freezing $18 million on two New York City infrastructure projects, “preventing funds flowing on the principles of unconstitutional (diversity, equity and inclusion).” The project includes a train tunnel between New York and New Jersey and a subway line running along New York City’s second avenue.
His post came on the first day of the event.
The winners of the cancelled award said that some of the projects included in the announcement have already begun the process, and the winners of the cancelled award will have 30 days to appeal the decision to close.
