Climate activists rally in front of the White House at Lafayette Square to demand that President Joe Biden declare a climate emergency and move the country rapidly away from fossil fuels, July 4, 2023, in Washington. After being thwarted by …House Republicans on Friday opened an investigation into President Biden’s newly formed American Climate Corps, a program that will provide government-funded jobs to train more than 20,000 young people for careers in green energy and the environment.
The lawmakers questioned the legality of the program because it was not authorized under a law created by Congress, a departure from the Roosevelt-era Civilian Conservation Corps that Mr. Biden’s program is modeled after.It asked AmeriCorps to turn over documents revealing the total cost of Climate Corps and all communications with partnering federal agencies, state governments and advocacy groups.Mr. Comer and Mr. Sessions also requested a staff-level briefing no later than Oct. 20.
Administration officials declined to reveal how much it will cost or where the money will come from. The president unsuccessfully sought to include a multibillion-dollar Climate Corps in Democrats’ tax-and-climate spending law was named the Inflation Reduction Act. The specific types of jobs young Americans will be trained for are also largely unknown. Some examples given by the administration included training to install solar panels, restore coastal wetlands and work as an electrician for green technologies. The White House also wants to focus on environmental justice, but it’s unclear what sort of specific jobs that would entail.