Two years removed from the train wreck of the Biden-Harris era, the American Left still has a major credibility crisis. Stinging from the generational inflation of the Biden years, they are desperate to center the 2026 midterm elections on “affordability.” Meanwhile, they continue pushing climate policies that are driving prices even higher.
New York is an excellent microcosm of this contradiction. It is home to titular leaders of the Democratic Party, such as Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), as well as its spiritual ones: U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, both self-described socialists.
Wherever the competing wings of the Democratic Party may disagree, they stand arm-in-arm on climate policy. In 2019, during the fever pitch of the Left’s resistance to the Trump administration, former Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed the “Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act.” Billed by supporters as “most aggressive climate change legislation in the nation,” the legislation had a stated goal of achieving a so-called “carbon-neutral economy” by 2050.
Joining Cuomo at the bill signing was former Vice President Al Gore, who hailed the CLCPA as “the most well-crafted legislation in the country.”
The law ushered in a series of anti-energy policies with clear consequences for consumers.
As part of an earlier agreement, Cuomo closed the Indian Point Nuclear Plant, responsible for roughly 25% of the power to New York City and Westchester County. The decision “spiked electricity costs,” as Politico described last year, especially as “New York confronts surging electricity demand.”
In late 2014, under Cuomo, New York became the first state with major shale reserves (including parts of the Marcellus Shale) to fully ban fracking, which is the process of extracting oil and natural gas from underground rock formations. The Marcellus Shale is the largest natural gas shale play in the United States, responsible for roughly one third of all U.S. natural gas supplies. An estimated 20 percent of the Marcellus lies beneath New York, yet the state imports nearly all its natural gas from other states, including neighboring Pennsylvania.
Pennsylvania made a different choice. Rather than ban the practice, its leaders embraced it and quickly became the nation’s second-largest producer of natural gas.
The economic results diverged sharply. According to an analysis from Power The Future, by 2023, Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania, on the New York border, was producing 41,301 thousand cubic feet (Mcf) of natural gas per capita each year, while neighboring Tioga County, New York, produced none. During the same time, Susquehanna County’s GDP increased by 211%, while Tioga County’s GDP grew by only 11%. Poverty also moved in opposite directions: Susquehanna County downward (11.3% to 10.9%), while Tioga County’s poverty rate rose from 9.6% to 12.2%.
The attacks on natural gas didn’t stop. In 2023, Gov. Kathy Hochul (D-NY) signed legislation prohibiting the installation of fossil-fuel equipment in most new buildings, with the rules phased in beginning in 2026 (later delayed amid legal challenges).
What’s all this have to do with prices, you may ask? New York has the fifth costliest price of electricity in the country. Natural gas fuels an estimated half of all electricity, and it has been demonized and outlawed by the climate crew for more than a decade.
Thankfully, a modicum of common sense may be returning.
In September, an Obama-appointed federal judge struck down New York’s “superfund” law targeting energy companies with sweeping financial penalties. The efforts of the Trump administration brought a new natural gas pipeline to customers in New York City and Long Island. Under unrelenting pressure for more supply, and after three previous state rejections, Hochul finally greenlit the project, although she opted for an unveiling of a portrait of Joe Biden at Syracuse University rather than attend the groundbreaking.
That is the left’s energy “strategy” in a nutshell. Oppose Trump at every turn, and promote so-called green energy, regardless of the cost to ordinary New Yorkers.
WE HAVE THE ENERGY, WE HAVE THE DEMAND. NOW WE JUST NEED PERMISSION TO BUILD
Remember New York the next time a liberal politician complains about the price of gas or utilities. Or a governor blames data centers for their supply problems, as Hochul did by signing a moratorium on their development so consumers could “turn on the lights tomorrow.”
Their policies created the affordability crisis. It didn’t happen overnight, and won’t get as fixed as fast either. But if the definition of insanity is doing the same things and expecting different results, step one is rejecting the climate agenda in favor of common sense.
Daniel Turner is the founder and executive director of Power The Future, a national nonprofit organization that advocates for American energy jobs. He also runs a sheep and cattle farm in rural Virginia. Contact him at [email protected] and follow him on Twitter @DanielTurnerPTF