Election Day Lessons for the Clean Energy Industry

By Dan Crawford

Democrats won across the board on Tuesday, from New York City and New Jersey to the swing states of Virginia and Georgia. It was a jolt of energy for a party that, a year ago, had lost its way. There’s no doubt that the election was a rebuke of President Trump. Voters are angry with the president for many reasons, but chief among them is the fact that he hasn’t done anything to bring down prices like he repeatedly promised he would. And when it comes to energy, his administration is actively making things worse.

Democrats Made Energy Prices a Cornerstone of their Campaigns

In New Jersey, Governor-elect Mikie Sherrill made energy prices, which increased more than 20% between July 2024 and 2025, a key part of her campaign. Sherrill made a bold promise to freeze electricity rates while taking the fight to the state’s grid operator, PJM, who many blame for the state’s rate hikes. By showing she was going to fight for ordinary ratepayers (and not worrying too much about the details) she separated herself from incumbent Democrat Phil Murphy, and put Republican Jack Ciaterelli on the defensive. And she did it while embracing clean energy, as part of an all-of-the-above strategy that included building new solar and nuclear, while modernizing the state’s natural gas facilities.

“So whether it’s PJM—the grid operator—or FERC or [the Board of Public Utilities], whether it’s President Trump rolling back some of the initiatives on solar or adding $250 per family to your energy bill, everybody at the table is at fault,” Sherrill said in a September debate. “I’m going to add massive amounts of power into the grid. Right now, we need to produce power here in our state because the market has been screwed up by PJM and because Virginia has a million data centers which are sucking all the power out of our market.”

Speaking of Virginia, where datacenters are the subject of intense debate, Governor-elect Abigail Spanberger centered affordability and tied Republican Winsome Earle-Sears to President Trump’s attacks on clean energy. And in Georgia, two Democrats broke Republicans’ total control over state government, getting elected to the state’s Public Service Commission on a promise to lower electric bills and increase development of renewableÍs.

The Clean Energy Industry Should Seize This Moment

There are lessons here for Democrats, of course, who are entering the 2026 midterms with the wind at their backs, having finally found a way out of the wilderness by focusing relentlessly on costs. But there’s a lesson for the clean energy industry, as well. 

Energy has never been more salient of an issue. When was the last time reforming a grid operator was a key issue in a statewide election? Have public utility commissioners ever gotten so much attention? Americans are paying more attention to where their power comes from, how it gets to their homes, and how much it costs than ever before. That’s a real opportunity for the clean energy industry, which accounted for 93% of new energy capacity last year. The industry has an opportunity to galvanize support and harness its growing political power.

Secondly, the industry needs to embrace its role in lowering costs and powering the American economy. For years there was a clear moral imperative for the transition to carbon-free energy, but for ordinary Americans more concerned with balancing their budgets every month, it just wasn’t a priority. Thanks to technological advances, especially in solar and storage, clean energy isn’t just good for the environment—it’s cheap and it’s easy to deploy. The clean energy industry doesn’t have to appeal to climate concerns, which have always taken a backseat to pocketbook issues. Industry leaders and their allies across the business community should lean into clean energy’s growing role in the energy mix and its role in bringing down costs. 

To win the pocketbook debate, the industry’s message has to evolve. It should continue to champion advances in clean dispatchable power and pointing out that new solar-plus-storage plants are now cheaper to build than new gas peaker plants. Industry leaders should follow Governor-elect Sherrill’s lead and demand grid modernization and market reform, framing recent price spikes as a failure of outdated grid rules and backlogs that prevent clean power from connecting fast enough to meet new demand. Finally, the industry should push for reforms that make it easier to build out transmission—a critical investment in American infrastructure that will buy us long-term price stability and an escape from the volatility of global fossil fuel markets.

With the president relentlessly attacking clean energy projects and slowing down development when it’s needed most, there’s never been a better time for the industry to go on the offensive—with ads, contributions, and organizing. Everyone running for office should know that supporting clean energy is a winning policy, and they attack it at their own peril.

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