The Civic Node

Carlsbad company among those hit by Trump's cuts to energy projects

3 min read

Summary

NOTUS investigative analysis of the Trump administration’s cancellation of ~$8 billion in DOE clean energy grants, showing through data analysis of hundreds of projects that the cancellations tracked political alignment: Democratic states lost funding while Republican states retained comparable projects. The piece reveals the cuts as a deliberate shutdown leverage tactic — with explicit confirmation from the White House press secretary — and documents significant implementation confusion and legal process gaps.

Key Points

  • ~$8 billion in energy grants canceled; announced by OMB Director Russ Vought during the shutdown
  • Pattern: canceled projects were overwhelmingly in states that voted for Harris/Democrats; equivalent projects in Trump-voting states were retained
  • Examples of the disparity: $460M interregional transmission (Minnesota, Democratic) canceled vs. $700M Eastern-Western grid connector (Montana, Republican) retained; Hawaii grid resilience canceled vs. Georgia Power resilience retained
  • Battery recycling: 3 of 17 projects cut — all 3 in California and Colorado; 14 others (national labs, Republican/swing states) retained
  • White House press secretary Leavitt explicitly linked restoring cuts to passing the clean CR: “Pass the clean continuing resolution and all of this goes away”
  • Energy Secretary Wright contradicted Leavitt, claiming cuts were unrelated to shutdown and more were coming — including in red states
  • Confusion: states received no official notice until day after announcement; some still awaited formal notification 3 days later; inconsistent appeals windows (10 days vs. 30 days stated)
  • Projects already underway: canceling mid-project means wasted already-spent funds
  • Carlsbad, CA: Smartville (battery storage) confirmed cancellation; Sublime Systems (previously told May cancellation) in appeals
  • IBM methane research categorized under NY awards but project located entirely in Trump states (Utah, Montana, Alaska) — cut anyway
  • GTI Energy (focused on natural gas modernization — a stated Trump priority) lost 13 grants

Newsletter Angles

  • This is the cleanest example of the shutdown-as-weapon pattern: federal funding used as coercive leverage against Democratic states, with explicit White House confirmation. The “pass the CR and this goes away” quote is the smoking gun.
  • The contradictory signals from Leavitt and Wright reveal internal administration disarray — either the cuts are shutdown leverage or they’re permanent policy, but they can’t be both simultaneously
  • The GTI Energy and IBM examples (projects cut that serve Trump priorities, or in Trump states) expose the implementation as more politically crude than strategically coherent: the targeting wasn’t precise enough to avoid own-goals
  • The NOTUS methodology (hundreds of projects analyzed) makes this the best data-driven piece on the energy cut pattern — better sourced than most news coverage of the same announcement

Entities Mentioned

Concepts Mentioned

Quotes

“Pass the clean, continuing resolution and all of this goes away.” — White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt

“He had neither the courtesy nor the care to mention that this was coming… That tells you everything you need to know about how this Administration operates: in the dark and with no respect for the people hurt by their decisions.” — Sen. Martin Heinrich (NM)

Notes

NOTUS is a publication from the nonpartisan Allbritton Journalism Institute; distributed via Newswell partnership (including Times of San Diego). This is investigative analysis backed by data, not opinion. The methodology (analyzing hundreds of projects against political alignment) makes it more than anecdote. Published October 5, 2025 — 4 days into the shutdown.

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