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The Week in Climate Hearings: A Tennessee Showdown and Energy Shakeup
Climate hawk Aftyn Behn's long shot; unconstitutional changes for the Department of Energy; Confirmation hearings for Elon Musk's fanboy and Mike Johnson's landlord
Brad Johnson
December 02, 2025
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The fossil-fueled cyclones Senyar and Ditwah have taken more than 1,140 lives in Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Malaysia within the past week.
Tennessee Showdown
Today, voters in rural Tennessee are going to the polls to fill the vacant seat in the Trump +22 Seventh District, with state Rep. Aftyn Behn the Democratic candidate against the Trump-endorsed Matt Van Epps. Behn is a true climate hawk. As she wrote in the aftermath of the fossil-fueled Hurricane Helene, which killed over 250 people, in October 2024:
“The flooding in Appalachia stands as a stark reminder of the urgent need to confront both the human and environmental costs of corporate exploitation… The people of Appalachia deserve justice for the immediate relief from climate disasters and the long-term repair of the ecosystems and economies destroyed in the name of profit.”
Republican leadership have swarmed the district. In an anemic rally on a billionaire’s estate yesterday, Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La., no relation) joined Sens. Bill Hagerty and Marsha Blackburn, Gov. Bill Lee, Reps. Tim Burchett, John Rose, and Andy Ogles, to laud Van Epps and to attack Behn as a Marxist like Zohran Mamdani, whom Johnson described as the new leader of the Democratic Party and a Hamas sympathizer.
Big Moves For the Department of Energy
Senate Republicans, after some engagement with Democratic appropriators, have released their proposed FY2026 Energy and Water Development appropriations package, with an explanatory report. The legislation would increase defense spending by 3 percent and non-defense spending by 6.5 percent. In particular:
Grid Deployment Office cut by 25 percent
Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy cut by 10 percent
Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy budget cut by 5 percent
Top Democratic appropriator Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) noted that the package “delivers critical funding for the Office of Science and supports national labs across the U.S. with the funding needed to continue their critical, cutting-edge work and prevent devastating layoffs.”
Congress has not extended presidential reorganization authority to Trump, but that hasn’t slowed his administration down. The Department of Energy, which OMB Director Russ Vought recently took control from the putative secretary Chris Wright, is the latest branch of the federal government to purportedly undergo an illegal and unconstitutional reorganization.
A new organizational chart posted on the Department of Energy website shows that the Offices of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, Grid Deployment, Clean Energy Demonstrations, Critical and Emerging Technologies, Manufacturing and Energy Supply Chains, and Fossil Energy and Carbon Management are merged into a new Office of Critical Minerals and Energy Innovation. The State and Community Energy Programs, Federal Energy Management Program, and the Office of the Ombudsman are also supposedly gone.
In related news, the department announced that the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, whose name is specified in 42 U.S. Code § 15801, would now be known as the “National Laboratory of the Rockies.” Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) issued a milquetoast statement that did not challenge the illegal name change.
With the recent closure of Utah’s Intermountain Power Plant, California’s electricity is now coal-free.
Congressional Hearings
The billionaire Jared Isaacman and the millionaire Lee Beaman have their nomination hearings this week. Republicans continue to move forward with increasing domestic mining and ignoring global warming. Also, they will advocate for killing more sea lions.
Credit: marneejill
Tuesday, December 2
At 10:15 am, the House Natural Resources Committee’s Federal Lands Subcommittee holds a hearing on compelling DC ICE collaboration, Gateway Arch Privatization, National Parks no-bid leases, and other bills. The priority of the subcommittee was the Make the District of Columbia Safe and Beautiful Act (H.R. 5103), with testimony from Park Police officials and the head of the D.C. police union, in favor of forcing the District of Columbia to collaborate with Trump’s immigration agents.
At 10:30 am, the House Energy and Commerce Committee’s Energy Subcommittee
holds a hearing on securing the electric grid from cyber and physical threats. Although the prepared testimony of some witnesses makes side mention of the rising dangers of wildfires, storms, heat, floods, and drought caused by man-made global warming to the grid, most of the emphasis is on investment against cyberattacks.
At 3 pm, the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee’s Public Lands, Forests, and Mining Subcommittee holds a hearing on 26 pieces of legislation.
Wednesday, December 3
At 10 am, the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee holds the nomination hearing of Lee Beaman to be a member of the Board of Directors of the Tennessee Valley Authority and Douglas Weaver to be a member of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Weaver is a seasoned nuclear regulator, who has been a corporate nuclear lobbyist for the past decade after twenty years at the NRC.
In contrast, Beaman is a Nashville auto executive, Republican mega-donor, and the subject of sexual misconduct allegations. He has no professional experience in nuclear oversight, utility planning, or grid operations. He is the former CEO of Beaman Automotive Group, a chain of car dealerships he sold in 2020, and now operates Beaman Ventures, a private investment firm, and serves on the board of Belmont University, a private Christian college in Nashville. As the Energy and Policy Institute notes, Beaman is also a member of the Council for National Policy, “a secretive, invitation-only, Christian nationalist network whose members have opposed environmental regulation, denied climate science, and pushed to roll back democratic safeguards.” In court documents, his fourth wife described being forced into watching Beaman having sex with a prostitute for her “training”, and being exposed to pornography in the presence of her minor son. Kelly Beaman accused her husband of “degradation, control, manipulation and abuse” in the marriage.
Most notably, Beaman owns a $3.7 million Capitol Hill townhouse once occupied by abolitionist Frederick Douglass, which serves as a residence for Speaker Johnson (still no relation), the aforementioned Rep. Ogles, megachurch pastor Steve Berger, and other GOP politicians and operatives.
Also at 10 am, the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee holds a hearing on on the nominations of Jared Isaacman to be Administrator of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, and Steven Haines to be Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Industry and Analysis. Isaacman, a tech billionaire, is an extreme admirer of Elon Musk and SpaceX. Isaacman was nominated in the spring to be NASA administrator, with his nomination hearing on April 9th. Right before the vote on his confirmation, the White House pulled his nomination. He was renominated this fall. NASA is illegally moving forward with the rapid downsizing of the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. Haines, who joined the U.S. government after working as manager for Chinese production and sales for a penumatic valve company and a China analyst for Ernst & Young, recently worked as a staffer for the aforementioned Sen. Hagerty.
At 10 am, the House Natural Resources Committee’s Water, Wildlife and Fisheries Subcommittee holds a hearing on sea lions and salmon in the Pacific Northwest.
At 2 pm, the House Natural Resources Committee Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee holds a hearing on promoting domestic mining, with several mining executives and technologist Walter Copan.
Thursday, December 4
At 9 am, the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee Space and Aeronautics Subcommittee holds a hearing on how China is now the leader in space exploration.
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