Democrats refer Wright to DOJ for prosecution, accusing him of lying to Congress

Energy & Environment Democrats refer Wright to DOJ for prosecution, accusing him of lying to Congress Comments: by Rachel Frazin - 08/05/26 2:42 PM ET Comments: Link copied by Rachel Frazin - 08/05/26 2:42 PM ET Comments: Link copied

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Two House Democrats have formally referred Energy Secretary Chris Wright to the Department of Justice (DOJ) for potential prosecution, accusing him of lying to Congress about whether green grants were canceled for partisan reasons.

In a letter made public on Wednesday, Reps. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) and Gabe Amo (D-R.I.) accused Wright of lying when he testified that the billions in climate-related funding was not selected for cancellation because it would have primarily gone to Democratic states.

“Secretary Wright lied to the Committee with his statements, which sought to prevent us from learning the truth: that the October award terminations were an act of political retaliation,” Lofgren and Amo wrote in their letter to acting Attorney General Todd Blanche.

“In doing so, he violated 18 USC §1001, which bars individuals from making ‘any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or representation’ to Congress. We have no choice but to refer Secretary Wright to the Department of Justice for potential prosecution in this matter,” they added.

The referral does not necessarily mean that the Justice Department will take up the case — the Trump administration is unlikely to go after one of its own Cabinet secretaries — and it also does not necessarily mean Wright is guilty.

But it is a significant escalation in tensions over the nearly $8 billion that the Trump administration axed last year.

At the time the cancellations were announced, White House Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought touted them and described the money as “Green New Scam funding to fuel the Left’s climate agenda.”

He also announced that the cuts would affect projects in California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Vermont and Washington state — all places won by former Vice President Kamala Harris in the 2024 election.

At the time, Wright said some funding would also be canceled for red states, though these cancellations never materialized.

Wright has repeatedly said that while partisan reasons may have influenced the timing of the projects’ announcements, the decisions to actually cancel the grants were not made for partisan reasons.

In recent court documents, however, an Energy Department lawyer said that “inclusion of grants in the October notice tranche was based solely on the political identity of the grant recipient’s state.”

The attorney indicated that the inclusion of the grants in the tranche of cancellations was not “based on any programmatic, statutory, cost-reduction, or performance-based factor.”

The Democrats cited the court document in their referral, contrasting it with Wright’s assertion that accusations of canceling the grants on the basis of politics were “bulls—.”

“Secretary Wright was very clear in his testimony. No decisions were based on politics. The award termination decisions should not have been based in any way on how a state voted in the 2024 presidential election, and they weren’t. In the Secretary’s own words, it was bullshit to suggest otherwise. Secretary Wright lied,” they wrote.

While the Energy Department did not immediately offer comment on the referral, it previously maintained that Wright was telling the truth after the court documents came into public view.

“None of the termination decisions were based on political considerations,” spokesperson Ben Dietderich said last month.