Trump’s Interior Department Is Using Biden-Era Court Cases to Advance Its Anti-Wind Agenda

The administration is siding with plaintiffs that once sued the federal government for approving wind projects.

Offshore wind turbine
David Goldman/AP

Anti-wind energy groups spent the last four years fighting the Biden administration in court to stop renewable energy projects. The Trump administration has inherited those cases — and is using them to carry out the president’s anti-wind crusade.

President Donald Trump has made no secret of his dislike of wind turbines. “They’re ugly, they don’t work, they kill your birds,” Trump said during a Cabinet meeting this week. His administration has issued several headline-grabbing stop work orders for wind projects.

More quietly, Trump’s administration is twisting Biden-era legal cases into another pathway to block wind energy development — in ways that often betray the legal facts of the cases, former Department of Justice attorneys and environmental experts say.