ICYMI: Syracuse.com: Trump cancels clean energy grant to expand Syracuse factory: ‘It’s just killing us’

More than 80,500 clean energy jobs have already been lost or delayed under Trump, 47% of them in congressional districts represented by Republicans 

Washington, D.C. – Today, reporting from Syracuse.com revealed that Donald Trump’s decision to cancel $8 billion in investment across the country is forcing a factory in Central New York to consider cancelling their expansion plans. Blitzer Scroll Inc. was planning to add a new assembly line that would have created 20 new jobs, but Trump’s announcement may be the final straw for the company, which is already reeling from $10 million in increased costs due to Trump’s tariffs and has cut 39 jobs in recent months as a result. Trump and Republicans have already taken a sledgehammer to investments in both red and blue states, now they’re overseeing the demolition of good paying jobs in exchange for tax cuts for billionaires.  

Syracuse.com: Trump cancels clean energy grant to expand Syracuse factory: ‘It’s just killing us’

A Central New York factory that makes parts for electric heat pumps says it may cut back its expansion plans after President Donald Trump’s administration canceled a $5 million grant to help pay for the project.

The $25 million expansion at Bitzer Scroll Inc. in DeWitt would add a new assembly line for the company’s high-efficiency compressors and initially create 20 new jobs.

But the Department of Energy said Thursday it is terminating grants totaling nearly $8 billion for 223 clean energy projects in 16 states…

John Allcott, vice president of North American operations for Bitzer Scroll, said he didn’t receive notice from the Department of Energy until after he was contacted Thursday by a syracuse.com reporter.

He said the canceled grant is the latest challenge for Bitzer as it tries to expand an American plant set to benefit from rising demand for energy-efficient heat pumps…

“It impacts us significantly,” Allcott said of the lost funding. “It would just be far harder to finance the expansion. We’d probably end up dropping some components of the project, and that hurts all around.”

Bitzer Scroll was already dealing with $10 million in increased costs this year after Trump added import tariffs on Chinese-made motors used in its products, Allcott said.

Those motors cost about $108 each, he said. But now the tariffs have added $118 per unit in extra costs, more than the motor itself.

“The whole thing of Trump bringing jobs back to America is completely running in reverse for us,” Allcott said. “It’s just killing us.”

He said employment at the plant in a former John Deere warehouse has dropped from 152 to 113 people in recent months amid the rising costs and uncertain economic conditions.

“It’s not an easy time right now,” Allcott said. “If I was a board member right now at Bitzer, I might be saying it doesn’t make any sense to manufacture in America.”…

Allcott said he plans to ask the company’s board in Germany if it wants to come up with extra funding to make up for the loss of the federal grant and keep its expansion plans on track.

“I just don’t know if they will have the appetite to invest that kind of money with what they’re seeing right now,” he said, referring to the Trump administration’s policies. “It’s just so counterproductive. You have to think it through because you’re hurting American business.”…

Sen. Charles Schumer, D-NY, the Senate minority leader, said Trump’s move to cancel the grants is part of an “endless campaign for chaos and revenge” against Democratic-majority states.

He suggested the timing is linked to the shutdown of the federal government that began Oct. 1 after Democrats in Congress refused to pass a funding bill.

Democrats have been pushing to restore Trump’s cuts to Medicaid and to renew tax credits for Affordable Care Act premiums in any new spending plan.

“This goes beyond targeting blue states,” Schumer said in a statement. “It’s taking a wrecking ball to working families’ lives, putting construction workers out of a job and raising families’ electric bills for political gain.”…

Schumer said the canceled projects represent billions of dollars of private investment and tax revenue that will be lost to local communities.

“Instead of playing politics with the shutdown, President Trump should be working on bipartisan solutions to lower Americans’ costs and create jobs,” Schumer said.