Congress
Senate confirms Chris Wright as Trump’s energy secretary
Chris Wright, the Denver-based fracking CEO tapped by President Donald Trump to lead the Energy Department, was confirmed to the role by the Senate Monday evening.
Senators voted 59-38 to confirm Wright, including support from some Democrats, despite opposition to his nomination from environmental groups and their party’s leadership in the Senate who criticized his comments downplaying climate change as a serious global threat.
Wright has pledged to pursue an all-of-the-above energy strategy at the agency, which oversees a wide array of energy research and development, maintains the country’s nuclear stockpile and operates the network of national laboratories.
“What I like most about Mr. Wright is that he tells the truth about energy production. He acknowledges that climate change is real. He knows more American energy is the solution, not the problem,” said Senate Majority Whip John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) on the floor last week. “His energy realism is welcome news.”
Wright spent his career pioneering fracking technologies that have helped revolutionize the oil and gas sector and turned the U.S. into the world’s largest producer of those energy sources. He is currently the CEO of Liberty Energy and is on the board of Oklo, a company developing small modular nuclear reactors. Liberty Energy is also an investor in enhanced geothermal start-up Fervo Energy.
Once confirmed, Wright pledged to divest interests and stocks and resign from his positions with Liberty Energy, Oklo and EMX Royalty, a global mining royalties company.
During his confirmation hearing last month, Wright detailed three “immediate tasks” he would focus on if confirmed: unleashing American energy at home and abroad to “restore our energy dominance,” pursuing innovation and technology breakthroughs and cutting red tape for energy and infrastructure projects.
Colorado Democratic Sen. John Hickenlooper, who has known Wright for years, acknowledged there are ample issues the pair disagree on, which has prompted “heated discussions” on the federal government’s role in addressing climate change, in particular.
But Hickenlooper — who introduced Wright at his confirmation hearing — ultimately supported his confirmation Monday.
“He genuinely listens. He gives honest answers. He has pledged he will follow the facts,” Hickenlooper told Blue Light News.
“In a funny way he is going to give the Senate the chance to have a real debate again on how fast is the climate changing and how do we measure which parts of extreme weather are a part of that.”
Wright has come under scrutiny for his previous statements and views over the threat from climate change. Environmental groups, like the League of Conservation Voters, have criticized him as a wealthy Big Oil executive with direct conflicts of interest heading the department, as well as for his previous statements — some of which, like the connection between wildfires and climate change, he doubled down on during his confirmation hearing.
At the hearing, Wright acknowledged climate change is a global challenge that needs to be solved, but noted there are trade-offs between that and the need to boost energy production.
As secretary, Wright will also oversee an Energy Department that was expanded by former President Joe Biden to implement Democrats’ climate law, the Inflation Reduction Act, and other programs under the bipartisan infrastructure law.
Much of that funding is currently in question as the department undergoes a review of projects and spending spurred by Trump.
Some Democrats expressed concern about Wright’s willingness to help protect those investments, which Republican lawmakers are targeting under planned reconciliation legislation.
“The IRA is on the table in reconciliation. They [Republicans] want to repeal it,” said Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.). “And in my state, the number one benefit to our clean energy economy, to creating jobs, and all the innovation and projects happening there is because of the bipartisan infrastructure package, the CHIPS and Science Act and most important the Inflation Reduction Act.”
Senate Energy and Natural Resources ranking member Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.), who voted in favor of Wright’s nomination, told Blue Light News he expected Wright before the confirmation process to be “dogmatic in his thinking on energy,” given his public comments promoting fossil fuels and downplaying climate change.
But Heinrich said in his conversations with Wright, the energy executive’s answers on upholding appropriated clean energy spending “were fairly clear.”
Wright will replace Ingrid Kolb, who has been serving as secretary in an acting capacity, since Trump’s inauguration.
The president also nominated James Danly, a Trump-appointed FERC commissioner, as deputy secretary.
Elsewhere in the department, Alex Fitzsimmons will serve as Wright’s chief of staff, while Trump tapped Wells Griffith for undersecretary of energy and Darío Gil for undersecretary for science and innovation.
Wright will also sit on the National Security Council and could play a key role in the National Energy Dominance Council that is still taking shape.
Senate Judiciary Chair Chuck Grassley rescheduled a planned vote on Todd Blanche’s nomination as attorney general late Friday in a preemptive move as negotiations between the Trump administration and GOP holdouts continue.
The vote, now set for Tuesday after a scheduled Thursday vote was postponed, isn’t an indication that a deal allowing for Blanche’s confirmation is near, so much as it is a nod to Judiciary Committee rules that require three days of notice for a panel meeting.
There is no sign that President Donald Trump is about to acquiesce to the unflinching demands of Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), who wants a controversial settlement agreement between Trump and the IRS substantially pared back.
Cornyn, who lost his primary to a Trump-endorsed candidate, wants the Justice Department to nullify a $1.8 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund” and limit the scope of a tax audit immunity component of the pact.
Trump told reporters earlier Friday the fund is “dead” but added “I wish it weren’t.”
“I’d like to see them compensated,” he added, referring to people he considers victims of government abuse, including participants in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack.
To advance Tuesday, Blanche needs to pick up Cornyn and Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), another senator on the panel with similar concerns. He can’t lose any GOP votes if he wants to be reported favorably out of the Judiciary Committee.
“Chairman Grassley wants Todd Blanche’s nomination to be successful,” said a Judiciary Committee spokesperson, who declined to be named. “Noticing the markup gives more time for the White House to secure the votes for the President’s nominee. Grassley would like to see Blanche confirmed before the August recess as he has an excellent record restoring law and order and keeping Americans safe.”
House Majority Leader Steve Scalise is zeroing in on one of House Republicans’ biggest contests — a purple district in Nebraska — when he starts his recess campaign sprint.
Scalise will travel to Nebraska’s 2nd Congressional District in the Omaha area for an event with Republican Brinker Harding in the coming days, according to a person with direct knowledge of the matter granted anonymity to share plans not yet made public. Republicans are digging in to defend the seat, which Kamala Harris won in the 2024 presidential race and is among Democrats’ best pick up opportunities this fall as they seek to flip the House.
Harding is running against Democratic consultant Denise Powell to replace retiring GOP Rep. Don Bacon. Bacon, a moderate-leaning Republican, flipped the Omaha district red in 2016.
After Nebraska, Scalise is planning to travel across the country throughout August, including to defend GOP incumbents Mariannette Miller-Meeks’ and Zach Nunn’s key battleground seats in Iowa’s 1st and 3rd Congressional Districts and Derrick Van Orden in Wisconsin’s 3rd Congressional District.
He’ll boost candidates working to flip blue districts like Laurie Buckhout in North Carolina’s 1st Congressional District, Derek Merrin in Ohio’s 9th Congressional District and Mike LiPetri in New York’s 3rd Congressional District.
Scalise also plans to travel to Michigan, Colorado, South Carolina and Texas for campaign events over the August recess.
President Donald Trump goaded John Cornyn on social media Friday morning, accusing the Texas senator of withholding his vote on Todd Blanche’s attorney general nomination in retaliation for Trump’s central role in his political demise.
Cornyn, who lost his May primary to Texas’ scandal-ridden attorney general, the Trump-endorsed Ken Paxton, has threatened to block Blanche’s nomination in the Senate Judiciary Committee until the White House promises to permanently shelve its $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization fund” in writing — something Trump appears unwilling to do.
“John Cornyn never had a problem with the so called “Fund,” which will not benefit me, but rather the great American Patriots who were hunted down like dogs and whose lives were unfairly and illegally destroyed by the Crooked Joe Biden Administration, until after I decided to Endorse and Support his Republican Primary opponent in Texas, who easily won the Nomination for the United States Senate,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
Several Republicans bristled at the fund, which could have been deployed to compensate Americans who faced charges after the Jan. 6 Capitol riot and which gives the president and his family audit immunity over taxes. At his July confirmation hearing, Blanche said that the fund, part of a settlement the president reached with the IRS, was defunct. But the administration has been “reluctant to change” the text of the settlement, Cornyn told reporters Thursday.
Trump signaled his continued support for the Jan 6 rioters on Friday.
“I will always feel that these victims of government abuse should be paid back for what they were forced to endure, their lives have been ruined!” he wrote. “Millions of people agree with me, as was proven in my landslide Presidential win, where this was a major subject of debate, and so did John Cornyn, until he lost his Election to an opponent that I Endorsed.”
On Thursday, the president suggested that he could punt a Senate vote on Blanche until after Cornyn — and Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) — leaves the chamber at the end of the year. Cornyn, however, suggested on social media that there are other Republican senators with concerns about the fund.
“After the midterms, who knows who’s going to be the next United States senator from North Carolina or Texas?” Cornyn told reporters.
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