By Isaac Orr
Michigan families, businesses, and manufacturers are already feeling pain at the plug. According to our recent report, Blue States, High Rates, Always On Energy Research, and the Institute for Energy Research, Michigan’s electricity prices are the highest in the Midwest, and it is worth considering how the policies supported by Congressional candidates will shape energy policy in the coming years.
In the race for Michigan’s 10th Congressional District between Republican Mike Bouchard and Democrat Christina Hines, the candidates’ proposed energy policies have fallen along predictable ideological lines.
For example, Ms. Hines has stated that she supports “Fighting climate change while creating American jobs.” Hines has also stated that she will “support legislation like the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) that helps bring clean energy manufacturing back to the U.S. while reducing carbon emissions and strengthening our domestic supply chains.”
While these types of campaign promises sound good in theory, in practice, they carry as much weight as promising that spending this money will cause the Detroit Lions to win the Super Bowl.
According to an analysis from the Cato Institute, the IRA would have lavished $935 billion to $1.97 trillion in taxpayer dollars on wind, solar, and electric vehicles from 2025-2034. Data from the Rhodium Group show that the vast majority of the tax subsidies that were actually distributed under the law went to more conservative states, like Texas, Georgia, and Tennessee, which have lower taxes and more reasonable regulatory regimes.
On the other hand, Michigan did manage to secure projects, but many of them were heavily subsidized using additional state taxpayer dollars. An analysis from the Mackinac Center found IRA-linked projects received $873 million in subsidies and created just 194 jobs so far, a cost of $4.5 million per job.
One Michigan electric vehicle (EV) project receiving these subsidies has already abandoned the EV market because the overwhelming majority of Americans don’t want to buy them. Even with federal tax credits available, EVs accounted for just 8.1% of new-vehicle sales in 2024. After the credits expired, their market share fell to just 5-6% by July 2026.
Furthermore, IRA subsidies for wind and solar projects are essentially energy bailouts for blue states with high renewable energy mandates, like Public Act 235, which was signed into law by Governor Gretchen Whitmer (D) and established aggressive renewable energy mandates of 50% by 2030 and 60% by 2035. The law also requires an 80% “clean energy” standard by 2035 and 100% by 2040.
In contrast, Mr. Bouchard has stated he supports energy independence to rein in fuel prices and reduce regulatory barriers to building more power plants as part of a broader energy dominance agenda.
Energy dominance in the Trump administration’s second term has consisted of boosting natural gas and oil production, financing new nuclear power plants and reforming our permitting process for nuclear plants to facilitate their timely and cost-effective production, facilitating more geothermal energy production, and keeping existing coal plants online to bolster the grid as demand for electricity surges to power data centers and a reshoring of American manufacturing.
In our recent report, Blue States, High Rates, Always On Energy Research and the Institute for Energy Research found that 86% of the top ten states in the continental U.S. with the highest electricity prices have voted for the Democratic candidate in each of the last two presidential elections, while 90% of the 10 states with the lowest electricity prices have voted for the Republican candidate.
Pro-energy policies make the U.S. the world’s largest producer of oil and natural gas, help facilitate a revival of our environmentally friendly nuclear energy industry, and recognize the importance of keeping existing coal plants online to keep the lights on. Repeating the same energy policy mistakes of the IRA and expecting different results will end poorly for Michiganders and America.
Isaac Orr is the Vice President of Research at Always On Energy Research.
This article was originally published by RealClearEnergy and made available via RealClearWire.
