Peace Garden News

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Kevin Cramer (R-ND) joined Larry Kudlow on Fox Business to discuss his recent op-ed published in the Wall Street Journal on the principles needed to reach a commonsense agreement between Republicans and Democrats on transmission reforms and President Biden’s push for widespread adoption of electric vehicles. He also commended Speaker McCarthy for reaching an agreement on the debt ceiling with President Biden.

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On the Latest Permitting Provision Included in the Debt Ceiling Deal:

“Investment only happens in an environment of certainty—one year for an environmental assessment, two-year shot clock for environmental impact statements. You're taking [project timelines] from six, seven, eight, 10 years down to one and two years, which means investment will follow.”

“With 25 agencies, or even if there’s five agencies, they don’t do things concurrently, they do them chronologically. […] That’s one of the ways the bureaucracy holds things up, and this gets to that cost issue—the PAYGO issue. Not only does it cost the economy money to have these long permitting processes, it costs the government money because the bureaucrats are working all the time running the clock. It's a much bigger deal I think than many people might realize.”

On Wall Street Journal Transmission Op-Ed:

“[Liberal states] worship at the altar of climatology, so all of this makes sense to them, but what we are lacking is enough electricity generation to do all the things this infrastructure would demand. Whether it's electric vehicle charging stations or getting electricity from North Dakota to a neighboring state that doesn't want the type of electricity North Dakota creates, so they want to get somebody else's electricity. They want regional transmission organizations to be required to send more electricity to other places, except there's not enough electricity.”

“It's like building the cart before the horse. You simply have to do things in chronological order to have any type of a transition and wishing [traditional energy sources] away with crazy proposals like electric vehicle charging stations before there's enough electricity or enough electric cars to use it. It’s typical socialism.”

On Debt Ceiling Negotiations:

“It’s hard for me to imagine a deal that would pass the House of Representatives wouldn't easily pass the Senate. The alternative to this deal would be a clean debt ceiling increase. Whether you vote for it or not, you’re facilitating that by voting against it.”

Original source can be found here.