Tessera

Whitney Muse

@whitneymuse.bsky.social

Energy and Climate policy. Formerly White House and Dept. of Energy. Always a beach lover, seeking more scuba diving trips, watching women's basketball, and reading a good book. https://museenergyllc.com/

23 Posts149 Follower 203 Folgt

John Rogers @johnrogers.bsky.social · 5d ago

Power is to be used, or it's not power.

Michael Clemens @mclem.org · 3mo ago

Incredible. When E—n M—k & his crew obliterated USAID in a weekend, they deleted a vast trove of publicly-funded knowledge: the Development Experience Clearinghouse. A Canadian high school student (!) happened to have downloaded the entire thing for a project. AidData has now posted it for all.

Before reimagining development data, remember what we’ve learned

Why we’re publishing a free, searchable, and ungated archive featuring a quarter-century of USAID evaluation reports.

aiddata.org

Kevin Elliott @kjephd.bsky.social · 3mo ago

SHOOT IT INTO MY VEINS

Over the past year, the three of us have been listening to and learning from former government officials, academics, and other policy experts. The lesson we are taking away is this: in a future rebuilding every major policy and institutional design choice should be evaluated not just on what it delivers, but on whose power it builds and whose power it diminishes.

Henry Farrell@himself.bsky.social · 3mo ago

I remember seeing someone (very reasonably) complaining here a few days ago that there seems to be next to no visible thinking on left and center about how to join the dots on administration and democracy. This is the beginnings of an answer to that complaint donmoynihan.substack.com/p/rebuilding...

Whitney Muse @whitneymuse.bsky.social · 6mo ago

Does this apply only to LA, the 5th circuit or nationwide?

Chris Geidner@chrisgeidner.bsky.social · 6mo ago

BREAKING: Fifth Circuit three-judge panel of all Republican appointees blocks rule allowing mailing of mifepristone, agreeing with Louisiana challenge to a policy ending the in-person dispensing requirement for the abortion drug. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

Before SOUTHWICK, DUNCAN, and ENGELHARDT, Circuit Judges.
STUART KYLE DUNCAN, Circuit Judge:
In Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, 597 U.S. 215
(2022), the Supreme Court returned the regulation of abortion to the states.
In response, the Biden Administration directed federal agencies to "expand access to ... medication abortion." Exec. Order No. 14076, 87 Fed. Reg. 42053 (July 8, 2022). The next year, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) formally altered its safety guidelines for the abortion drug mifepristone. Under the new regulation, the drug could now be prescribed online and dispensed through the mail, without any need for an in-person visit to a doctor.
In 2025, Louisiana challenged the new regulation in federal court under the Administrative Procedure Act (APA). It argued that FDA's justifications for remotely dispensing mifepristone were based on flawed or nonexistent data. It also documented how the new regulation had resulted in numerous illegal abortions in Louisiana and in Louisiana paying thousands in Medicaid bills for women harmed by mifepristone. Louisiana sought a stay of the regulation while the litigation proceeded.

Sam Bagenstos @sbagen.bsky.social · 8mo ago

And see: www.lawfaremedia.org/article/the-...

The Trump Administration’s Legal Shell Game

Recent attempts to block wronged federal grantees from having their day in court reflect a broader Trump administration strategy.

lawfaremedia.org

Sam Bagenstos@sbagen.bsky.social · 8mo ago

An important piece showing that losses in court haven’t stopped Trump from seizing Congress’s spending power and targeting dissenters and “blue states.” www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

Whitney Muse @whitneymuse.bsky.social · 9mo ago

Worked so hard to get this money... yet another thing to get canceled and erased

Costa Samaras@costasamaras.com · 9mo ago

Just a few weeks ago, the administration cancelled all remaining department of energy grid resilience projects in Puerto Rico. All of them. www.latitudemedia.com/news/the-end...

Whitney Muse @whitneymuse.bsky.social · 9mo ago

Bad Bunny's done it well for years. "El Apagón" criticizes the extended power outages on the island, the privatization of the power system in Puerto Rico, and gentrification on the island

Post nicht verfügbar.

Philadelphia Inquirer @inquirer.com · 12mo ago

Pennsylvania’s top legislative leaders and Gov. Josh Shapiro have agreed to a $50.1 billion state budget deal behind closed doors, according to two sources close to negotiations. 🔗 www.inquirer.com/politics/pen...

Pennsylvania’s top leaders have reached a $50.1 billion state budget deal, signaling a breakthrough in impasse

Top legislative leaders and Gov. Josh Shapiro have agreed on a budget framework after months of talks, according to two sources close to negotiations.

inquirer.com

David Dayen @ddayen.bsky.social · last yr.

The SNAP fight is actually a recapitulation of the entire purpose of the shutdown. There's a contingency fund, Trump is required to spend it, but he's not, usurping Congress's power of the purse, essentially so he can do it again with normal appropriations whenever he wants

DC Attorney General Brian Schwalb@dcattorneygeneral.bsky.social · last yr.

NEW: We just filed a lawsuit alongside 25 states to restore SNAP food assistance during the federal shutdown. 141,000 DC residents rely on SNAP to afford their meals — including 47,000 children and 24,000 seniors. We will do everything in our power to prevent DC families from going hungry.

Whitney Muse @whitneymuse.bsky.social · last yr.

Also, seeing new federal delays in the permitting for the Greenlink transmission lines that are designed to move power from Esmerelda 7 and other neighboring projects to where people and business need power in Nevada.

Major Nevada transmission project hits snag in military air space

Greenlink West developers have pushed back the completion date of the 470-mile power line to May 2027.

eenews.net

jae holzman@jael.bsky.social · last yr.

SCOOP: The Bureau of Land Management says the largest solar project in Nevada — the Esmeralda 7 mega-farm — has been canceled The news was quietly dropped via a sudden website update with no public word from any of the companies involved or a statement from the agency @heatmap.news

Joey Fishkin @fishkin.bsky.social · last yr.

The "compact" is a threat, with the administration explicitly stating that it plans to disfavor universities that don't sign in areas from foreign student visas, student loans, federal contracts as well as grants, and even tax [501(c)(3)] status. It's a maximalist plan of 1st Amendment violation.

washingtonexaminer.com

lisa martine jenkins @lisamartinejenkins.bsky.social · last yr.

Yesterday, Russ Vought tweeted out that DOE is canceling nearly $8 billion in clean energy funding. Today, @latitudemedia.bsky.social @maeveallsup.bsky.social obtained the list of all 321 projects that are having their awards pulled. 🔌💡 www.latitudemedia.com/news/scoop-t...

SCOOP: These are the 321 awards DOE is canceling

All of the awards, totaling $7.5 billion, are for projects in blue states.

latitudemedia.com

Carl Quintanilla @carlquintanilla.bsky.social · last yr.

BRUSUELAS: “.. Domestic electricity inflation inside the July consumer price index increased by 9.5% on a six-month average annualized basis. .. it will most likely move higher.” #CPI ⚡️

Moira Donegan @moiradonegan.bsky.social · last yr.

As someone who has lived my whole adult life in cities deemed “dangerous”—NYC, NOLA, and SF—I think a lot about how dense cities require patience, calm, and tolerance in the midst of social difference, which are of course exactly the civic virtues that the right resents being told to cultivate.

Whitney Muse @whitneymuse.bsky.social · last yr.

Anyone seen a graph comparing Jan 2025 tariff levels by country with the changes since then? Supply Chain Dive had a good breakdown of rhe changes since April www.utilitydive.com/news/3-ways-...

Brendan Pierpont @brendan.bsky.social · last yr.

Turns out forcing old, uneconomic coal plants to remain online when the operator wanted to retire them is expensive. Keeping Campbell running in MI has cost $29 million over 5 weeks: www.detroitnews.com/story/busine...

Consumers Energy spends millions keeping coal plant open per fed order

The utility expects the cost to be shared by customers in the north and central regions of the Midcontinent Independent System Operator.

detroitnews.com

jamelle @jamellebouie.net · last yr.

the position of the roberts court is both that racism isn’t real and that the constitution mandates a colorblindness so strict that it neither recognizes nor can act on social inequalities. incidentally, this is essentially the court’s holding in plessy v. ferguson.

Aaron Bady @zunguzungu.bsky.social · last yr.

not to be too gloomy, but I think it's just very hard to wrap one's head around the fact that the liberal order that started with the new deal is basically just gone for the foreseeable future, and how to deal with that *as* a fact

Aaron Bady @zunguzungu.bsky.social · last yr.

a thing I think about, from reading about Chile, is that getting rid of an authoritarian who imposes draconian libertarian austerity is one thing, but building back the things that said authoritarian destroyed, after the fact, is a second and distinct thing and doesn't naturally flow from the first

Whitney Muse @whitneymuse.bsky.social · last yr.

Maybe my grad degree in Latin American studies and international economics will come in handy these days...

Tom Pepinsky @tompepinsky.com · last yr.

About to get positively Argentinian up in here

Joey Politano🏳️‍🌈@josephpolitano.bsky.social · last yr.

Unquestionably the most dangerous and corrupt attack on the independence of US economic data in American history. Trump is firing the head of the BLS, a longtime civil servant confirmed 86-8 by the Senate, simply because the job numbers came in below his expectations today

I was just informed that our Country’s “Jobs Numbers” are being produced by a Biden Appointee, Dr. Erika McEntarfer, the Commissioner of Labor Statistics, who faked the Jobs Numbers before the Election to try and boost Kamala’s chances of Victory. This is the same Bureau of Labor Statistics that overstated the Jobs Growth in March 2024 by approximately 818,000 and, then again, right before the 2024 Presidential Election, in August and September, by 112,000. These were Records — No one can be that wrong? We need accurate Jobs Numbers. I have directed my Team to fire this Biden Political Appointee, IMMEDIATELY. She will be replaced with someone much more competent and qualified. Important numbers like this must be fair and accurate, they can’t be manipulated for political purposes. McEntarfer said there were only 73,000 Jobs added (a shock!) but, more importantly, that a major mistake was made by them, 258,000 Jobs downward, in the prior two months. Similar things happened in the first part of the year, always to the negative. The Economy is BOOMING under “TRUMP” despite a Fed that also plays games, this time with Interest Rates, where they lowered them twice, and substantially, just before the Presidential Election, I assume in the hopes of getting “Kamala” elected – How did that work out? Jerome “Too Late” Powell should also be put “out to pasture.” Thank you for your attention to this matter!

Robinson Meyer @robinsonmeyer.bsky.social · last yr.

It’s hard to find a trend in the electricity system right now that *doesn’t* point to near-term rate hikes if not a broad affordability crisis. That’s a serious problem for climate policy, but also the American economy writ large. I wrote about it: heatmap.news/politics/ele...

What is less well understood is how poorly the United States is prepared to match this rise in electricity demand with an equivalent increase in supply. To some degree, American electricity prices are already rising: So far this year, utilities have received or requested permission to increase customers’ bills by $29 billion, according to a July report from PowerLines, a think tank and advocacy group. That’s a large number in its own right, and it’s more than twice as much as had been approved at this time last year.

But when you look across the power system, virtually every trend is setting us up for electricity price spikes:

The supply chain to build new natural gas power plants is backed up. Virtually all new utility-scale gas turbines are spoken for until the end of this decade, as Heatmap News covered in February.
U.S. natural gas supplies will come under more strain in the next few years as fossil fuel companies export more of the fuel abroad. From 2024 to 2028, North America’s liquified natural gas export capacity is projected to double.
Many of the key components to build more grid infrastructure — such as copper or steel — have surged in cost due to Trump’s tariffs and self-induced trade uncertainty.
The federal government has become a less stable fiscal and financing partner for energy producers and distributors. On Wednesday, Energy Secretary Chris Wright killed a government loan guarantee for the Grain Belt Express transmission project. Why? “To ensure more responsible stewardship of taxpayer resources,” but also because President Trump asked him to.

Avi Zevin @azevin.bsky.social · last yr.

Interior issues new memo in response to anti-wind/solar Executive Order that requires any of 69 types of decisions/actions to go to the Office of the Secretary. This is the way you stall and kill projects. Intentionally red-tape projects to death.

graham steele @grahamsteele.bsky.social · last yr.

According to this Supreme Court, President Biden's Department of Education was exceeding its power by trying to forgive peoples' student loans. President Trump, on the other hand, has the power to just completely dismantle the entire Education Department.

Mark Joseph Stern@mjsdc.bsky.social · last yr.

BREAKING: The Supreme Court allows the Trump administration to move forward with the abolition of the Department of Education. It gives no explanation for its order. All three liberals dissent. www.documentcloud.org/documents/25... From Sotomayor's dissent:

Lifting the District Court’s injunction will unleash
untold harm, delaying or denying educational opportunities
and leaving students to suffer from discrimination, sexual
assault, and other civil rights violations without the federal
resources Congress intended. The majority apparently
deems it more important to free the Government from paying employees it had no right to fire than to avert these very
real harms while the litigation continues. Equity does not
support such an inequitable result.
* * *
The President must take care that the laws are faithfully
executed, not set out to dismantle them. That basic rule
undergirds our Constitution’s separation of powers. Yet today, the majority rewards clear defiance of that core principle with emergency relief. Because I cannot condone such
abuse of our equitable authority, I respectfully dissent.

Zack Labe @zacklabe.com · last yr.

I can't stress enough how close U.S. science is to the cliff. "Numbers released in May by the National Science Foundation (NSF) indicate that if Congress approves the cuts to the agency proposed by the White House, the number of early-career researchers it supports could fall by 78%" (@science.org)

‘It’s a nightmare.’ U.S. funding cuts threaten academic science jobs at all levels

“There is a lot of pressure to essentially leave the country or not pursue research,” one Ph.D. student says

science.org

Avi Zevin @azevin.bsky.social · last yr.

Wrote a thing (with @jakehigdon.com). Congress is killing IRA tax credits in an effort to look "tough on China." But the effect will be the exact opposite.

Heatmap News@heatmap.news · last yr.

"In the end we will cede not only our supply chains to China, but also our competitive edge in the race for AI and manufacturing dominance." Former DOE staffers @azevin.bsky.social and @jakehigdon.com argue that the Senate megabill will hand energy dominance to China ⬇️

Avi Zevin @azevin.bsky.social · last yr.

NABTU gets it. “Equivalent of canceling 1000 keystone XLs” "Biggest job killing Bill in the history of the country"

Whitney Muse @whitneymuse.bsky.social · last yr.

Not just summer blackout risk. Winter too. And likely increased risk in shoulder seasons when there are planned outages and decreased generation available.

Post nicht verfügbar.

Whitney Muse @whitneymuse.bsky.social · last yr.

It will raise electricity prices, increase the likelihood of blackouts and brownouts, and reduce investment & jobs across the country.

Shannon Osaka@shannonosaka.bsky.social · last yr.

The GOP bill is much worse for wind and solar than clean energy experts expected. Many were scrambling today to understand exactly what the additional tax on wind and solar means -- and how much it will slow investment. From me and Evan Halper: www.washingtonpost.com/climate-envi...

Kristina Costa @slashklc.bsky.social · last yr.

A sweeping victory to destroy hundreds of thousands of energy sector jobs, including for union workers, and raise electricity prices for every American.

Shannon Osaka@shannonosaka.bsky.social · last yr.