WASHINGTON – The Alliance to Save Energy released the following statement from President Paula Glover on Thursday following the disturbing events at the U.S. Capitol and the outcome of the Georgia Senate runoff elections.

“There is no place in our democracy for the shameful attack on the Capitol that we saw Wednesday, which jeopardized the lives of law enforcement officers as well as members of Congress, their staffs, and workers across the Capitol. We only hope that these events make clear the profound danger that divisiveness and rabid partisanship pose to our country. The fact is the elections are over, and it’s time to come together as a country and refocus on cooperation and bipartisanship.

With the ballots counted, we want to congratulate Sens.-elect Rev. Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff of Georgia. They both have shown strong support for clean energy on the campaign trail, and we look forward to working with them in the coming weeks to begin rebuilding the energy efficiency economy and putting thousands of workers back on the job creating a more sustainable future.”

“The outcome in Georgia obviously has significant implications for the federal agenda for energy efficiency and other clean energy technologies. President-elect Biden has put forward a strong agenda for addressing climate change and building up the clean energy economy, and we are excited about the potential for Congress to make progress on many of our priorities in the coming months. There has always been strong bipartisan support for efficiency in Congress – a quiet majority in the middle that wants to do more but has been stymied by political gridlock and gamesmanship. We believe that this 50-50 result will pave the way for that bipartisan support to break through and enable real results for American workers and the climate in the coming year. We have a very closely divided Congress, but that means there is a big opportunity here for lawmakers to come together and pass meaningful recovery and infrastructure legislation.”

“With more than 300,000 energy efficiency workers still out of work as a result of the pandemic, Congressional action can’t come soon enough. While the bill passed into law in December provided good short-term relief, we need to start putting the policies into place that will kickstart economic activity and create jobs. Investments and incentives for energy efficiency have the potential to create hundreds of thousands of jobs for Americans who need them most while sharply reducing greenhouse gas emissions and lowering energy bills for consumers and businesses.”

About the Alliance to Save Energy

Founded in 1977, the Alliance to Save Energy is a nonprofit, bipartisan alliance of business, government, environmental and consumer leaders working to expand the economy while using less energy. Our mission is to promote energy productivity worldwide – including through energy efficiency – to achieve a stronger economy, a cleaner environment and greater energy security, affordability and reliability.

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