Trump Brings His War on American Clean Energy to New Jersey Funded By Big Oil

After another week in court with Big Oil continuing to fuel his legal defense, Donald Trump is taking his war on American clean energy to a Saturday rally in Wildwood, NJ. As America is taking off on a massive clean energy boom, with hundreds of thousands of jobs already announced, Big Oil is funding Trump’s attacks on President Biden’s clean energy investments, hoping to kill cleaner, cheaper energy choices so oil companies can continue gouging all of us. 

At a fundraiser at Mar-a-Lago with oil executives, Trump made clear that New Jersey jobs were in his crosshairs, telling them “I hate wind” and promising them he would crush it—along with other clean energy jobs—if given a second term. “If I were in the offshore wind industry, I would probably be pretty, pretty nervous,” a former Trump administration energy official told the Washington Post. As Liz Schuler of the AFL-CIO noted at the time, “In a whole new industry like offshore wind, we’re seeing the beginnings of workers coming together and collectively organizing… These are all things that would be at risk if there were a second Trump administration. So we think it couldn’t be more dire.”

Trump was the worst environmental president in history, stifling clean energy while China raced ahead, and he is now promising to pull the rug out from under an exploding American clean energy sector, including in New Jersey. All to appease his Big Oil legal defense funders, as they try desperately to keep their stranglehold over American energy.

Trump’s First Term Left a Trail of Destruction for Climate and Clean Energy

• Donald Trump worked to sabotage the solar industry by slow walking projects and lease sales, ended the solar investment tax credit, and levied tariffs on solar panels costing the U.S. 62,000 jobs and $19 billion in investments.   
• He stifled renewable energy projects that would lower energy costs and create American jobs while giving Big Oil a $25 billion tax break.     
• He fought to eliminate electric vehicle tax credits, favored China, and killed American manufacturing jobs.
• He gutted more than 100 environmental protections and repealed landmark pollution reduction standards for power plants, vehicles, and more –– moves that will lead to thousands of additional premature deaths each year and cost Americans billions of dollars in savings and health benefits.

A Second Trump Term Would Be a Boom for Big Oil At the Expense of Everyone Else

• Trump is campaigning on repealing Biden’s clean energy plan, putting hundreds of thousands of jobs and hundreds of new factories in jeopardy, pulling the rug out from under innovative American businesses and ceding competition to China.
• Big Oil knows that their stranglehold on American energy is ending and are stepping up as some of the biggest funders of Trump’s legal expenses.
• At a recent Mar-a-Lago fundraiser with oil company CEOs, Donald Trump told the executives that he’d do much of what they want “on day 1” then asked them to contribute to his campaign and legal fees. 
• Big Oil executives and their allies have already contributed more than $6.4 million to Trump’s joint fundraising committee in just the first three months of 2024 – putting them on pace to surpass the $6.9 million the industry contributed in all of 2023.
• At that same fundraiser, Trump told his Big Oil backers he would derail wind energy manufactured here in America so the country stays dependent on Big Oil and other polluters. Big Oil has a record of funding anti-offshore wind disinformation campaigns.
• Trump’s shadow government, Project 2025, is already laying out plans to eliminate the Energy Department’s renewable energy office altogether and even block expanding the electrical grid for wind and solar.

President Biden has done more to expand clean energy choices made in America than any president in American history. His clean energy plan has created more than 270,000 good jobs and brought more than $350 billion in investments to communities in red districts and blue. In less than three years, the Biden administration has approved 10 gigawatts of clean energy from offshore wind, enough to power 4 million homes. It’s lowering costs and providing cleaner, cheaper choices for Americans, all while helping preserve our planet for future generations.

Donald Trump and his Big Oil backers want to undo all of it simply so they can continue price-gouging Americans for massive profits while funding Trump’s legal defense for the crimes he is charged with from his first term as president.