White House senior adviser Tom Perez predicted President Joe Biden’s signature climate law will withstand GOP attempts to roll it back — just as the Affordable Care Act passed under his former boss survived repeal efforts.
“Just like the ACA, this is part of our ecosystem,” said Perez, the director of the White House’s Office of Intergovernmental Affairs, during POLITICO’s Energy Summit. Perez formerly served as Labor secretary under former President Barack Obama.
The Biden administration is racing to get federal spending out the door ahead of the November election. But the potential return of former President Donald Trump — who has repeatedly criticized Biden’s support for clean energy — could mean undoing or undermining parts of the administration’s signature climate legislation, the Inflation Reduction Act, and progress under other laws like the bipartisan infrastructure law.
But Perez painted an optimistic picture Wednesday, telling the crowd that the climate law is “grafting into the ecosystem and the consciousness” as a wave of announced investments into clean energy projects — largely to GOP-led congressional districts — have launched across the U.S.
