‘People Power Has Won The Day’: Manchin Dirty Deal Defeated

Climate campaigners and people on the frontlines of the planetary emergency celebrated Tuesday after Sen. Joe Manchin requested that his fossil fuel-friendly permitting reforms to be stripped out of a stopgap funding bill.

“People power has won the day,” said Protect Our Water Heritage Rights Coalition (POWHR) organizer Grace Tuttle. “Thank you to everyone who rallied together to stop this bill. We will keep fighting alongside you. Our letters, calls, rallies, and grassroots activism secured this victory.”

“We recognize that the fight is not over, and we stand with all frontline communities from the Gulf Coast to Alaska facing fossil-fueled injustices,” Tuttle vowed. “Our movement to stop the Mountain Valley Pipeline is bigger and stronger than ever. We will keep fighting to end the era of fossil fuels and for the future we deserve.”

Food & Water Watch executive director Wenonah Hauter declared that “tonight’s turnaround represents a remarkable, against-all-odds victory by a determined grassroots climate movement against the overwhelming financial and political might of the fossil fuel industry and its Senate enablers.”

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) agreed to hold a vote on permitting reforms in exchange for Manchin (D-W.Va.) supporting the Inflation Reduction Act. However, a growing number of lawmakers indicated in recent days that they would oppose an urgent government funding bill if it included the “dirty deal,” which would fast-track fossil fuel projects.

However, given the mounting opposition to his Energy Independence and Security Act, Manchin on Tuesday evening asked Schumer to cut out his proposal.

“While the campaign against polluting oil and gas is far from over,” said Hauter, “this repudiation of Sen. Manchin’s so-called permitting reform bill marks a huge victory against dirty energy—and also against dirty backroom Washington deal-making.”

“This victory would not have been possible without the coordinated efforts of hundreds of national and grassroots organizations, along with concerned Americans from coast to coast, working together for the health and safety of frontline communities and a livable future for the planet,” she stressed.

Also, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), a leading opponent of Machin’s bill, swiftly congratulated the more than 650 groups “who made clear that, in the midst of the horrific climate crisis that we face, the last thing we need is a side deal which would build more pipelines and fossil fuel projects that would have substantially increased carbon emissions.”

Originally published at Commondreams.org.