Legislation to help more small businesses recover from natural disasters fell victim Thursday to a dispute on the Senate floor about clean energy loans.
Republican Sens. Thom Tillis and Ted Budd of North Carolina and Democratic Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia attempted to pass a bill by unanimous consent to refill the Small Business Administration’s disaster loans account. It ran out of money last month amid a surge in loan applications following hurricanes Helene and Milton.
The trio ultimately pulled their bill in the face of opposition from Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), who had offered an amendment that would have paid for the $550 million SBA infusion by clawing back $810 million the Inflation Reduction Act allocated for the Department of Energy’s Loan Programs Office.
“All we gotta do is take some money that’s laying around in a pot of money — Green New Deal boondoggle money going to big corporations — and put it in for disasters,” Paul said. “We can do that today.”
