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Exposing the Taxpayer Funded Green Slush Fund

February 28, 2025

February 28th, 2025

The issue: Trump’s energy czar has a plan to ‘Map, Baby, Map’ America’s vast array of energy resources. Energy Czar Doug Burgum spoke of the opportunity at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Maryland last weekend.

Why it matters: First it was “Drill, Baby, Drill,” with President Trump proclaiming that pledge on the campaign trail last year. Upon election that mantra continued, soon to be accompanied by “Build, Baby, Build,” a phrase adopted by The Empowerment Alliance that we hear repeated by this administration.

Burgum, the Interior Secretary, has added another phrase: “Map, Baby, Map” touting a plan for mapping deposits of oil, gas and critical minerals on US federal lands, casting it as an opportunity to catalyze development of the energy resources, reduce dependence on foreign suppliers and pare the nation’s debt.

Consider: Burgum also drew a sharp contrast with the Biden administration, saying the efforts to promote “part-time, intermittent and expensive power” from renewable sources amounted to “stealing” taxpayer dollars, raising electricity costs and jeopardizing the grid, in pursuit of “some kind of mythical energy transition.”

Biden did everything he possibly could to hinder domestic energy production, including blocking mineral rights on 225,000 acres of land in Minnesota.

This plan complements TEA’s Common Sense Energy Agenda and model legislation, the Affordable, Reliable, Clean Energy Act formulated by the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) last July.

Here are the key points of that act, all of which meet the criteria that Burgum has spoken about frequently.

  • Domestic Production: The fuel source must be primarily produced domestically within the United States.
    Check.
  • Affordability: It has a stable, predictable cost. It’s readily available.
    Check and check.
  • Reliability: The resource must be readily available to meet energy demands 24/7 with minimal interruptions during high usage periods.
    Check.
  • Clean: “Green energy” will be redefined as meaning any energy generated by using an energy resource in which the emissions are equivalent to the standard set by pipeline quality natural gas, (those emitted by millions of residential gas stoves).
    Check.

“Map, Baby, Map” is about identifying where are energy resources are located, as Burgum outlined. “Build, Baby, Build” is a mantra calling for new infrastructure like pipelines, export terminals and natural gas plants to get the energy where it needs to go. Energy Secretary Chris Wright used that phrase in a recent address. Both mapping and building are a critical part of realizing President Trump’s “Drill, Baby, Drill” goal that was promised on the campaign trail. This week Trump again pushed for the Keystone XL pipeline project, saying: ‘Get it built.”

Bottom line: After 4 years of relentless attacks, American energy is set for a comeback. Trump’s team will map, build, and drill with the common goal of restoring American energy dominance.

The issue: An environmental justice adviser to former President Biden received millions in taxpayer funds after personally applying for an EPA grant.

Why it matters: Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has uncovered another green slush fund used to repay political quid pro quos (a favor for a favor). This seems to have been all too common under the former president.

Kickbacks, political favors and who knows what else will be uncovered.

Meanwhile, the bank accounts of nonprofits administering a $20 billion climate program have been frozen as the program faces significant scrutiny from the Trump administration.

Consider: Three instances — that we know of so far — constitutes a gross pattern of misbehavior by the powerful Environmental Protection Agency. And that’s after roughly a month of Elon Musk’s-led DOGE.

  • First there was the Stacey Abrams-linked scheme where the Biden admin allowed eight entities to distribute taxpayer dollars ‘at their discretion.’
  • Current EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin likened the energy “scheme” that saw $2 billion in funds sent to a Stacey Abrams-linked climate group to “throwing gold bars off the Titanic.”
  • Add to that the EPA awarding a $5 billion eco grant to a group that had employed Jahi Wise, the senior EPA official overseeing that same grant program, and you have the perfect trifecta of fraud, waste and abuse.

Zeldin summed it up this way:

“The waste and abuse was so deeply interwoven in the last administration that not only did the leaders who oversaw this not bat an eye at billions of your taxpayer dollars going towards partisan pet projects, but serious conflicts of interest were ignored. That should have raised red flags.”

It certainly seems like the agency’s protection was for friendly, extreme green groups and political cronies, not for the environment. Thus, a total waste of our hard-earned money to the tune of billions of dollars.

Bottom line: The news keeps getting worse for Biden’s hallmark climate bill as new EPA chief Lee Zeldin investigates how taxpayer funds were used to benefit activists and allies of the former president’s inner circle.

Hearing On Affordable Electricity: On Wednesday, March 5, the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Energy will have a hearing called “Scaling for Growth: Meeting the Demand for Reliable, Affordable Electricity.”

Hearing On EPA Nominations: On Wednesday, March 5, the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee will have a hearing on Environmental Protection Agency nominations.

The US Geological Survey has “got a job to actually go out and map those resources to find out how many trillions or hundreds of trillions of dollars of assets belong to all of you, the public. So we’re going to map, baby, map. And then we’re also going to mine, baby, mine.”

— Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, speaking at CPAC.