Markey leads colleagues demanding taxpayer funds aren’t used to block offshore wind 

Senator Markey, a member of the Environment and Public Works Committee, sent a letter to the chairs and ranking members of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittees on Commerce, Justice, Science and Related Agencies; Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies; and Financial Services and General Government.

His letter follows the Trump administration’s announcement that it would pay TotalEnergies nearly US$1Bn not to build two offshore windfarms off the East Coast of the US.

The Senator and others believe that such payments, which may be unlawful, are a gross misuse of taxpayer dollars that will reduce American energy independence, increase US reliance on volatile and expensive fossil fuels, destroy jobs and increase costs for consumers. 

The letter was also signed by Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn), Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Senator Christopher Murphy (D-Conn), Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), Senator Peter Welch (D-Vt), Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vt) and Senator Cory Booker (D-NJ).

In the letter, they wrote, “The trust of the American public and the fair use of taxpayer dollars depends upon our ability to ensure that federal agencies do not engage in legally questionable and opaque deals with foreign private companies, especially when those deals will decrease our energy independence, raise costs at home, and simply defy common sense.”

They continued, “The administration’s legally dubious TotalEnergies payoff comes at a time when Americans’ energy bills are skyrocketing. Electricity bills have risen as much as 13% since the start of this administration, and the price of a gallon of gasoline has climbed by more than US$1.00 per gallon since President Trump attacked Iran. In these conditions, the Administration’s plan to deprive Americans of a clean, affordable, reliable energy source – all while subsidising a foreign energy company’s operations – is even more nonsensical.”

In March, Senator Markey and Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (NY-14) wrote to Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum in opposition to the Trump administration’s payoff to TotalEnergies using taxpayer funding and demanding answers on the legal basis for this decision.

Mr Markey and Ms Ocasio-Cortez asked the administration to stop the pay-off, which, they said, will keep much-needed American-made power off the grid, and to explain the statutory authority and funding source of the proposed transfer. 

The windfarms could have produced enough electricity to power more than 1M homes and businesses in New York and New Jersey, and approximately 300,000 in North Carolina.

In December 2025, Senators Markey and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass) sent a letter to Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth demanding access to the Department of Defense classified reports that the Department of Interior cited in its decision to announce a pause on leases for all large-scale offshore wind projects under construction in the US.