The Week in Climate Hearings: El Apagón

Bad Bunny’s epic Super Bowl halftime show, a distillation of his 30-show Puerto Rico residency last summer, was a primer on Puerto Rico’s history as United States’ colony, including the lasting devastation of the 2017 fossil-fueled Hurricane Maria and the Wall Street cabal that controls the island’s collapsed power grid, which suffers from rolling blackouts to this day.

Bad Bunny sang an excerpt from El Apagón (Blackout), standing atop exploding telephones. The song’s video includes an entire 18-minute documentary, Aquí Vive Gente, on this crisis of climate injustice:

The Trump regime is formally reversing the 2009 climate pollutant endangerment finding this week, a blatantly illegal decision that is likely to be affirmed by the Trumpist Supreme court. “This amounts to the largest act of deregulation in the history of the United States,” EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin told the Wall Street Journal’s Meridith McGraw and Benoît Morenne. Lisa Friedman and Maxine Joselow explain how this has been an ideological mission of OMB Director Russ Vought, Vought lieutenant Jeffrey Clark, former Inhofe staffer and Project 2025 author Mandy Gunasekara, and Department of Energy general counsel Jonathan Brightbill for years.

In the wake of the gangland executions of Renée Good and Alex Pretti, Congress is debating the future of the Department of Homeland Security and its $200 billion slush fund for masked thugs and private-contractor concentration camps this week, on the floor, in press conferences, and in at least six hearings. On Tuesday, the House Homeland Security Committee grills the heads of ICE, CBP, and USCIS, Senate Judiciary’s John Cornyn (R-Texas) hosts white nationalists for a hearing on “Somali Fraud in Minnesota,” and Senate Homeland Security’s Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) holds another kangaroo court on Minnesota fraud; on Wednesday, the lawless Attorney General Pam Bondi goes before House Judiciary, and House Appropriations investigates the potential impact of a DHS shutdown on the department’s other agencies, including FEMA; and on Thursday, Senate Homeland Security holds another hearing on the Minnesota siege with Minn. AG Keith Ellison, GOP whip Tom Emmer (R-Minn.), and the ICE, CBP, and USCIS heads.

The Senate GOP are also expected to push forward on a resolution to blow up the Washington D.C. tax code, a move opposed by home-rule advocates, the D.C. Chief Financial Officer, and the D.C. business community.

Monday, February 9

On Monday, the House Rules Committee set up floor votes for two radically anti-environmental bills: the Undersea Cable Protection Act (H.R. 261), which would would prohibit the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration from requiring any authorization for the installation, continued presence, operation, maintenance, repair, or recovery of undersea fiber optic cables in a National Marine Sanctuary; and Securing America’s Critical Minerals Supply Act (H.R. 3617), which would permit the Trump regime to define fossil fuels as “critical minerals” and exempt them from environmental regulations.

Tuesday, February 10

At 10:15 am, the House Natural Resources Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee holds a hearing on a key form of graft for the Trump regime this year, public-private partnerships supporting America’s semiquincentennial on our public lands.

In the afternoon, the House Natural Resources Federal Lands Subcommittee receives
testimony on federal lands bills, including one commissioning a study on brush fires.

At the same time, House Foreign Affairs holds a hearing stoking fears of “weaponized” mass migration. The hearing, ostensibly about Russia driving people into European countries as a form of political warfare, is a transparent exercise in white nationalism.

Relatedly, a Senate Appropriations subcommittee holds a hearing on Haiti security and foreign assistance priorities at 2:30 pm.

Wednesday, February 11

On Wednesday afternoon, there are several hearings on climate policy.

At 1:45 pm, the House Natural Resources Committee marks up legislation on mining deregulation, seafood country of origin standards, wildfire study, National Parks, and other bills.

Then, at 2 pm, the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee marks up National Lab Cloud Computing and other bills.

At the same time, the House Foreign Affairs South and Central Asia Subcommittee holds a hearing on U.S. foreign policy in South Asia.

Also, the House Science Research and Technology Subcommittee takes testimony from witnesses on U.S. surface transportation research, including Diana Furchtgott-Roth, a notorious climate denier who was the lead author of the Project 2025 Department of Transportation chapter.

Finally, the House Homeland Security Emergency Management and Technology Subcommittee surveys the “threat of agroterrorism”, with DHS and USDA officials.