Americans are angry about the cost of living, and Democrats are busily exploiting that anger to win elections — even if it means lying to the public yet again.
Not content with undermining President Trump’s first four years in office with their Russiagate fable, or pretending that Joe Biden was perfectly fit to serve four more years in the Oval Office, Democrats are now blaming the Trump White House for the high cost of living.
It isn’t true, of course — under Trump, prices are up less than 3 percent. Prices surged more than 20 percent under Biden, caused by Democrats’ reckless spending and damaging programs.
And arguably nothing has been worse for Americans’ pocketbooks than the left’s climate agenda. Congestion pricing in New York, electric vehicle mandates (which Trump just attacked by changing CAFE standards) and the drive for electrification and renewable energy all caused costs to skyrocket.
Voters are furious about fast-rising electricity bills, which Democrats, incredibly, are blaming on Trump. They claim that in abandoning the Biden administration’s climate agenda, the White House is torpedoing low-cost solar and wind projects. In addition, they point to the rapid expansion of data centers as driving up utility bills.
Yes, the expansion of AI is boosting demand for electricity, but rising utility bills predate that development. And according to researchers at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, data centers may actually be keeping prices down, since they allows utilities to distribute the costs of expansion across a greater number of customers. “Over the past five years,” they write, “states with the highest load growth generally saw retail electricity prices decline in real terms.”
Further debunking the data center myth, Virginia hosts more data centers than any place on earth, and it has not experienced rising electricity costs.
So why are electricity prices increasing? There are many factors, but chief among them is the push for what they now call “electrification” in states like California and New York, and abandonment of cheap, reliable fossil fuels.
California’s effort to switch consumers to electric cars, heating and appliances has meant rising demand for electricity in the state. Higher consumption coupled with unrealistic renewable mandates has led to residential electricity prices in the state being 77 percent above the national average.
Nor is it just the impractical push for electrification that has driven power costs higher. It is also the war on fossil fuels waged by Biden and by blue-state governors. In foolishly rejecting the construction of new natural gas pipelines, for example, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) and her predecessors deprived their citizens of an historically low cost and relatively clean fuel. It is no surprise that Hochul recently reversed herself on prohibiting new natural gas pipelines from entering New York; she wants to be reelected and has to bring down electricity prices that are 48 percent above the national average.
Consider the trajectory of electricity prices in recent years. Between 2010 and 2020, the price of electricity in California jumped 39 percent, from 14.75 cents/kwh to 20.45 cents. The price of electricity for the U.S. overall during that time rose by only 14 percent, pushed higher in part by the soaring costs in the Golden State. New York actually saw prices decline modestly, but that was before Dems’ climate agenda took hold. Between 2020 and 2025, prices in the Empire State jumped by 44 percent, from 17.6 cents per k/Wh to 25.3 cent k/Wh.
Soaring prices in California, New York and other blue states like New Jersey and Massachusetts had nothing to do with data centers and everything to do with policies that prioritize renewables — policies much like the ones that have slowed Europe’s growth and made its companies uncompetitive.
The Wall Street Journal recently published a piece titled “Europe’s Green Energy Rush Slashed Emissions — and Crippled the Economy.” The authors report: “European politicians pitched the continent’s green transition to voters as a win-win: Citizens would benefit from green jobs and cheap, abundant solar and wind energy alongside a sharp reduction in carbon emissions.” They go on to show that the climate agenda has been costly for consumers and has crushed growth.
Germany, for instance, has the highest domestic electricity prices among all developed nations (42 cents per k/Wh, compared to 14 cents in the U.S.). In the United Kingdom, industrial users pay 34 cents per k/Wh, the highest for any developed country, compared to 8 cents in the U.S.
And again, these ruinous prices for electricity have nothing to do with data center growth. In fact, because power costs are so high, Europe is also falling behind in the AI race. It has, instead, everything to do with Germany adopting its own green new deal, called Energiewende, or “energy transition,” in 2010. That program created excess dependence on renewable energy, which was so unreliable that it led to increased burning of coal and even dirtier lignite to plug energy shortfalls early on.
Trump has made developing U.S. energy resources a central plank of his economic agenda. Oil production in the U.S. is now at an all-time high of 13.8 million barrels per day; as a result, oil prices are down 13 percent from this time a year ago.
Natural gas production is also at record levels but prices have jumped, mainly due to Europe’s decision to prioritize liquified natural gas imports over Russian gas. A lot of the needed fuel is being exported from the U.S. More output will ultimately reduce costs.
Yes, data center growth is expanding and pushing electricity needs higher. But the all-of-the-above energy strategy from the White House will meet that demand. The U.S. must dominate the AI race, or China will. Abundant and cheap fossil fuels will keep us in the pole position to do just that.
This article originally appeared on TheHill.com
