PORTSMOUTH, Va. — When President Donald Trump tried to cancel five massive offshore wind projects under construction along the East Coast, it wasn’t just environmentalists who cried foul. Nine Republicans in the U.S. House sent a letter to administration officials demanding an explanation.
“America’s energy policy should be grounded in facts, fiscal responsibility, and the national interest – not ideology or politics,″ they wrote.
One of the lawmakers is Rep. Jen Kiggans, a former Navy helicopter pilot who represents a coastal district in Virginia where an $11.5 billion wind farm is expected to create 1,000 jobs. Her support for an initiative targeted by Trump shows the scrambled politics of clean energy in an election year where Republicans are at risk of losing the House.
Kiggans could be even more at risk after Virginia voters on Tuesday approved a new congressional map that makes her competitive district more Democratic than before.
Trump’s broader campaign against clean energy resulted in the cancellation of nearly $35 billion in U.S. projects last year, according to a report by E2, a clean energy business group. Republican-held congressional districts lost nearly twice as much in investments than did Democratic districts, the report said.
For now, the Virginia project is back on track, along with the other four, because of federal court rulings. But Elaine Luria, a former congresswoman who is seeking the Democratic nomination in the 2nd Congressional District represented by Kiggans, said the incumbent’s efforts have been futile in the face of Trump’s onslaught.
“Her advocacy did nothing,” Luria said. Kiggans did not respond to requests for comment.
A president who hates ‘windmills’
Trump has treated energy issues as another front in the nation’s cultural clashes, referring to Democrats’ support for clean energy as the “Green New Scam.” He frequently talks about his hatred of “windmills,” which he described as “STUPID AND UGLY” on social media. He issued an executive order on the first day of his second term blocking wind projects and he has insisted that “smart countries” do not use wind power.
Solar farms are not much better in his mind.
“You go around and you see all these things that are 3 miles long by 3 miles wide and you say what the hell is that,” Trump said at the White House last summer.
The administration even agreed to pay $1 billion to a French company to walk away from two U.S. offshore wind leases and instead invest in oil and natural gas projects.
Kiggans voted in favor of Republican legislation to gut clean energy tax credits as part of Trump’s sweeping tax and spending bill even though she has long portrayed herself as a champion of renewable energy. Democrats have turned the issue into campaign advertisements, and Luria said it undermines Kiggans’ attempt to “sell herself as if she’s a moderate.”
Luria said Kiggans “voted for a bill to make energy more expensive.”
In a Facebook post after the bill was passed in July, Kiggans said her vote “wasn’t about politics – it was about overall results.”
“I had ONE vote, and I voted YES on the One Big Beautiful Bill Act not because it was perfect but because it delivers permanent tax relief for families & small businesses, rebuilds our Navy & invests in national defense,” she wrote.
Stephen Farnsworth, a political science professor at the University of Mary Washington in Fredericksburg, Virginia, said front-line Republicans have been put in a difficult position.
“Kiggans is not the only Republican being squeezed” as Trump focuses on his own priorities and the country faces economic headwinds exacerbated by the war with Iran, he said. Although few want to risk upsetting the president, Farnsworth said, “in coastal Virginia politics, there’s not much upside to opposing wind.”
U.S. Rep. Tom Kean Jr., R-N.J., has been caught up in a controversy over the Gateway Tunnel, which will add new rail tracks under the Hudson River to alleviate congestion between his state and New York City. Trump tried to block federal funding, a potential setback for commuters in towns that Kean represents. A judge ordered the administration to restore money for the project after Democratic leaders in New Jersey and New York went to court.
An opportunity to lead on offshore wind
Although Trump has dismissed offshore wind turbines as ugly, the Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind project is about 27 miles (43 kilometers) out into the ocean, making it difficult to see from land. On a recent visit to the Portsmouth Marine Terminal, where construction is staged, the turbines were impossible to discern along the horizon.
Dominion Energy, which operates the wind farm, says it delivered its first power to the grid last month. The project, first announced in 2013, is expected to create 1,000 jobs and generate about $2 billion in economic activity, the company said.
Once finished, the 176-turbine project could deliver 2.6 gigawatts of power to the grid – enough to supply more than 660,000 homes – at a time when Virginia faces growing energy demand from an expanding hub of artificial intelligence data centers.
“There’s an opportunity here for Hampton Roads to be a national leader in offshore wind,’’ said Andrew Nissman, a spokesman for the Hampton Roads Workforce Council, which has trained maritime workers for the project.
Nissman declined to comment on the congressional race, saying, ”as with any stop-and-start challenge, it’s important the project is moving forward.’’
While the wind farm is now partially online, “Kiggans nearly cost her constituents this project by standing with an administration dead set on dismantling the offshore wind industry and voting to repeal critical clean energy tax credits last year,’’ said Dan Taylor, Southeast regional field manager for the BlueGreen Alliance, which coordinates labor unions and environmental groups.
“Kiggans claims to prioritize jobs, lower energy costs for Virginians and reducing emissions,” Taylor added. “Yet she voted to kill jobs, skyrocket energy costs to families and increase the emissions driving climate change.”
