The Caracas Carbon Coup

Elizabeth Warren trashes the Abundance billionaires; ICE Out For Good

Author

Brad Johnson
January 13, 2026

PRESENTED BY LESS-LETHAL WHIPPLE PUFF

Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Ct.) and Rep. Maxwell Frost (D-Fla.) are speaking at this afternoon’s ICE Out For Good rally and vigil outside the Customs and Border Patrol headquarters in Washington, D.C. The rally, organized by a coalition including Free DC, Indivisible, MoveOn, Public Citizen, ACLU, and others, begins at 5 pm.

Protesters clashed with federal agents for another night outside the Whipple Federal Building, which holds ICE detainees. Agents fired less-lethal munitions and deployed chemical irritants at the crowd. 📷️: Jeff Wheeler

— Minnesota Star Tribune (@startribune.com)2026-01-13T04:29:05Z

I’ve been gleefully trashing the Abundance bros (emphasis on bros) for ages (my more intelligent colleague Jordan Haedtler elicited Sandeep Vaheesan’s deep critique). I’m happy to report that Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) has joined the anti-abundance [sic] crowd.

In a speech yesterday at the National Press Club, Warren railed against the corrupting influence of billionaires on the Democratic Party such as Reed Hoffman, Dustin Moskowitz, Marc Andreesen, and Pat Collison who have been pushing the “abundance” scam to promote their planet-pillaging agenda. She called out Hoffman’s assault on “regulations that slow down data center construction”—which, by the way, is alto the top lobbying priority of Charles Koch’s Abundance Institute front group.

“‘Abundance’ has become a rallying cry — not just for a few policy nerds worried about zoning, but for wealthy donors and other corporate-aligned Democrats who are putting big-time muscle behind making Democrats more favorable to big businesses…

“Reed Hoffman is sending everyone he knows a copy of Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson’s book on abundance and backing pro-’abundance’ candidates. And on his podcast, Hoffman has used the framework to argue against regulations that slow down data center construction.

When families are already getting crushed by rising costs and a data center boom means even higher utility costs. When affordability is front and center in voters' minds, Hoffman wants Democratic candidates to stand with the billionaires for higher costs.”

we’re in the vet’s office waiting room and they just called for Agamemnon. we all looked at the Great Dane but it turns out Agamemnon is an orange kitten in a backpack that makes him look like an astronaut cheese puff

— Anjali Dayal (@anjalikdayal.bsky.social)2026-01-11T17:27:16.480Z

And now, some hot takes on the Caracas Carbon Coup!

“The Trump administration is behaving like gambling addicts chasing clout in an attention economy,” Liz Lopatto and Sarah Jeong write. “Venezuela is a fucking meme stock.”

“Donald Trump's vision of Venezuela feeding an American empire of oil,“ Karl Mathiesen and Zack Colman write in the oil-soaked Politico, “is a wager that years of talk about a global clean energy transition will come to nothing.”

Damien Gayle and Jillian Ambrose put numbers on that analysis, in the oil-free Guardian. “US plans to exploit Venezuela’s oil reserves could by 2050 consume more than a tenth of the world’s remaining carbon budget to limit global heating to 1.5C,” they report. “The oil extracted from Venezuela’s vast reserves is, according to industry estimates, the filthiest in the world.”

Trump is still pissy about Rex Tillerson, the Exxon CEO who was Trump’s Secretary of State and eventually correctly diagnosed Trump as a moron. Now Trump is threatening to keep Exxon out of his purported divvying up of Venezuela crude. It’s just so hard to stay on the good side of a fascist dictator, even when you’re the world’s largest oil major.

Although the photo isn't the best, it's my first picture of a marsh tit, and that makes it special.

At 2 pm, the House Rules Committee tees up a floor vote on the next bipartisan, bicameral appropriations minibus, the Financial Services and General Government and National Security, Department of State, and Related Programs Appropriations Act of 2026. The Nat Sec-State package concedes the Trump regime’s demolition of U.S. diplomacy. In better news, all of the new House riders on climate in the FSGG package have been dropped, other than the section prohibiting the Consumer Product Safety Commission from promulgating rules to “ban gas stoves.” D.C. Water and Sewer Authority is funded at the fiscal year 2025 level of $8 million, instead of the $6 million in the House version or the White House request of zero. Senator-directed earmarks include $1 million for Eastie Farm in Boston, $748,000 for the West Virginia Food and Farm Coalition, $700,000 for Farm Fresh Rhode Island, $610,000 for Oregon’s North Coast Food Web, and an egregious $600,000 for the Pennsylvania fracking-for-AI boosters Catalyst Connection for “Pennsylvania Al Data Centers & Energy Future,” requested by Sens. Fetterman and McCormick.

Al 2 pm, the House Natural Resources Committee’s Water, Wildlife and Fisheries Subcommittee holds a hearing on hunting and fishing access with U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service director Brian Nesvik, West Virginia wildlife resources director Paul Johansen, and hunting and fishing lobbyists.

Tuesday featured several other House hearings of interest:

At 10 am, the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation Subcommittee examined Coast Guard law enforcement efforts, which range from drug-boat interdictions to guarding against illegal fishing.

Also at 10 am, the Science, Space, and Technology Committee’s Environment Subcommittee held an open hearing on weather satellites and national security, with Irene Parker, Deputy Assistant Administrator for Systems, NOAA’s National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service, Col. Bryan Mundhenk, Chief, Weather Operations Division, United States Air Force, and Dr. Christopher Ekstrom, Deputy Chief of Naval Operations for Information Warfare and Deputy Director, Oceanography & Navigation, United States Navy.

At 10:15 am, the Natural Resources Committee’s Energy and Mineral Resources Subcommittee held a hearing on H.R. 5745, a bill intended to transfer liability for decommissioned offshore oil and gas platforms and pipelines to the states in the name of creating “artificial reefs.”

At the same time, the House Energy and Commerce Committee’s Energy Subcommittee held a hearing on five bills related to electric grid, pipeline, and LNG facility security, resilience, and emergency response—which, under this regime, means an expansion of an unaccountable surveillance state, particularly against climate activists. Witnesses include longtime right-wing energy operative Alex Fitzsimmons, Acting Undersecretary of Energy and Director of the Office of Cybersecurity, Energy Security, and Emergency Response, U.S. Department of Energy; Scott I. Aaronson, Senior Vice President, Energy Security and Industry Operations, Edison Electric Institute; Adrienne Lotto, Senior Vice President of Grid Security, Technical and Operations Services, American Public Power Association; Nathaniel J. Melby, Ph.D., Vice President and Chief Information Officer, Dairyland Power, on behalf of National Rural Electric Cooperative Association; and Rebecca O’Neil, Research Principal, Infrastructure, Energy and Environment Directorate, at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory.

Hearings on the Hill:

Climate Action Today:

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