EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin said he’s working to retrieve billions of dollars the Biden administration frantically shoveled to green energy and climate justice projects in the months before President Trump took office.
The money includes $20 billion that Biden officials deposited at Citibank, presumably to shield it from Trump administration officials.
“It was purposely designed to obligate all of the money in a rush job with reduced oversight,” Mr. Zeldin said, adding that he will enlist the EPA inspector general and the Justice Department to scrutinize the Biden administration’s money shuffle and spending spree.
The $20 billion was spread among eight organizations, among them United Climate, which announced in April it had accepted a $6.97 billion grant from the Biden-run EPA.
United Climate officials said they are using the money “to increase access to solar, electric vehicles, and green buildings through innovative financing.”
The organization, a nonprofit that formed from three smaller climate groups in 2023, has already spent a significant amount.
It has so far provided $32 billion for 18 solar projects in Arkansas, $250 million for a heavy-duty electric truck financing program in California, $30 million for a “pre-development” grant program for the development of clean energy projects in low-income and American Indian communities, and $11 million for a “pre-development” solar projects loan on tribal lands in eastern Oregon and Idaho.
Mr. Zeldin said he’s seeking to immediately retrieve the money from Citibank.
In what Mr. Zeldin described as an unprecedented move for the EPA, the Biden administration had established the bank as the financial agent for the $20 billion, which removed government control over the funds.
Mr. Zeldin said he will terminate that agreement.
“The days of irresponsibly shoveling boatloads of cash to far-left activist groups in the name of environmental justice and climate equity are over,” Mr. Zeldin said.
On Thursday, Mr. Zeldin said he canceled a $50 million environmental justice grant the Biden administration awarded to the Climate Justice Alliance, a group with slogans such as “climate justice travels through a Free Palestine.”
The Biden EPA became the repository for tens of billions of dollars for green energy and climate projects, much of it funded by the $1 trillion Inflation Reduction Act that President Biden signed in 2022.
Mr. Zeldin, in announcing his plan to claw back money, cited an undercover video taken after the election that suggested the Biden administration was frantically working to spend the funds quickly, before Mr. Trump took office. Mr. Trump has pledged to end government spending on green energy.
In the undercover video, released in December by Project Veritas, an EPA adviser revealed the agency was “trying to get the money out as fast as possible before they come in and stop it all.” The adviser also said, “It truly feels like we’re on the Titanic and we’re throwing like gold bars off the edge.”
Mr. Zeldin said he directed his EPA team “to find your gold bars and they’ve found them.”
• Susan Ferrechio can be reached at sferrechio@washingtontimes.com.