Climate Group Sues Trump and Citibank To Free Up Billions in Green Grants Handed Out in Final Months of Biden Administration

A green energy group awarded a $7 billion grant from the Biden administration is now suing President Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency and Citibank following the federal freeze on disbursement of the contract money. The $27 billion fund being used to pay out the grants is the same one that gifted $2 billion to a group with closed ties to two-time Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams.The group that sued, Climate United, funds green energy projects across the country for homeowners and businesses. As part of the Inflation Reduction Act’s Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, the organization was awarded just less than $7 billion in taxpayer funds in April last year to expand its operations, though those funds are now being blocked as part of the president’s attempts to withhold federal dollars from contractors and grant recipients whose missions he deems wasteful. Another group caught up in the GGRF drama is Power Forward Communities — a coalition of climate groups which received $2 billion from the same fund. Under that group’s umbrella is Rewiring America, which tries to move homes and businesses away from using fossil fuels. Ms. Abrams served as senior counsel for the organization until 2024, and Republicans in Georgia’s state senate are now considering opening an investigation into her work for that group.The GGRF grants have become a useful foil for Republicans and Elon Musk in his quest to slash executive branch contract payouts. On Sunday morning, Mr. Musk posted on X at least twice about Ms. Abrams’ work for her non-profit group, which supplied new home appliances to about 75 percent of households in the small town of Desoto, Georgia between 2023 and 2024 — work that then led the EPA to grant Power Forward Communities the $2 billion grant last year. During an interview with MSNBC on Thursday, Ms. Abrams said that the organization to which she is tied won the money after demonstrating that they could make homes greener. “In 2023 and 2024, I led a program called Vitalizing Desoto. We worked in a tiny town in south Georgia to demonstrate that by replacing energy inefficient appliances with efficient appliances, you can lower your costs,” Ms. Abrams said. “Based on that program, a coalition of organizations … came together and said to the EPA, ‘If we can do this here, we can do this for millions more Americans.’”The EPA administrator, Lee Zeldin, announced in February that he would put a hold on the GGRF funds because they were being used by “far-left activist groups” like Climate United. The money is currently parked at Citibank, which came to an agreement with the Treasury Department to act as a guardian of the funds after Mr. Biden left office. Mr. Zeldin says he is in the process of trying to claw back “every penny” that was sent to Citibank as part of the GGRF. “Defendants’ unlawful actions are causing Climate United to suffer real and immediate harm. Climate United does not have other committed sources of funding to replace the grant funds. Without those grant funds, Climate United will shortly run out of cash to pay operating expenses,” the lawsuit seeking to overturn Mr. Zeldin’s actions says. “Climate United’s access to its grant funding should be restored. The Court should direct Citibank to adhere to its contractual obligations, and bar EPA from interfering with Citibank’s disbursements.”Climate United does not blame Citibank, however. They say that the financial firm is simply being bullied into freezing the funds. “Citibank did not unilaterally decide to freeze funds on its own and stated in writing that it is awaiting further guidance from EPA. Although the EPA’s actions have been shrouded in secrecy, your own public statements show that the EPA is responsible for the freeze,” a lawyer for Climate United, Adam Unikowsky, said in a letter to Mr. Zeldin last week.

Climate Group Sues Trump and Citibank To Free Up Billions in Green Grants Handed Out in Final Months of Biden Administration

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