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Floor Speech
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Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I come to the floor today to rise in opposition to the nomination of David Crane, who has been nominated to serve as the Under Secretary of Energy for Infrastructure. It is a job that involves sending taxpayer money to energy companies. Mr. Crane has no business at all deciding how to spend taxpayer money on energy.
Mr. Crane spent 12 years--a dozen years--as CEO of NRG Energy, a job from which he was fired. It is not hard to see why he was fired. In his own words, he explained it. He said:
We were taking the profits from the coal plants and plowing it into solar development . . . that got to be annoying to the shareholders and to the board of directors of the company.
According to the Wall Street Journal, investors were very unhappy with Mr. Crane's investments in renewable energy. His strategy at the company led to a 59-percent drop in the company's share price the year before his departure. Once he was gone, the company's stock reversed course, with a long and sustained rebound.
Mr. Crane has significantly focused his career on combating climate change, which he has called the ``moral imperative of our time.'' He has called for ``name and shame'' activism against companies that do not share his extreme vision.
He once wrote that his ``green dream''--he said--included being considered ``the Mother Teresa of clean energy.''
Mr. Crane is welcome to spend his own money however he wishes, but he should not be permitted to waste hundreds of billions of dollars in taxpayer money in his effort--and it is a delusional effort--to be the next Mother Teresa.
America needs proven, reliable, cost-effective energy--affordable, available, reliable. We must unleash American energy production and therefore promote energy security for our Nation.
With our grids stressed and blackouts coming this summer, Mr. Crane has absolutely no interest in reliable energy. Instead, he wants to spend taxpayer money on sources of energy that make us more dependent on our adversaries, like China.
David Crane's record is that of a climate zealot. It is not what we need in this important post at the Department of Energy. We need someone who is dedicated to promoting affordable American energy, reliable American energy, available American energy. David Crane is clearly not that person; nor is he Mother Teresa.
So I urge my colleagues to join me in opposing this terrible nomination.
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