Today, the League of Conservation Voters led 27 environmental organizations in sending the below letter to the House of Representatives urging Members to oppose H.R. 8773, the Fiscal Year 2025 House Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act, when it comes up for a vote this week. LCV will strongly consider scoring votes related to H.R. 8773 in the 2024 National Environmental Scorecard.

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July 22, 2024

U.S. House of Representatives
Washington, DC 20515

Re: Please oppose H.R. 8773, which exposes Americans to avoidable climate risk. 

Dear Representative,

On behalf of our millions of members and supporters, the 27 undersigned groups urge you to oppose H.R. 8773, the Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act, 2025 (FSGG) as well as any amendments that further impair Americans’ ability to financially protect themselves from worsening climate events.

Climate change is having an immediate financial impact on communities across the United States. Extreme weather events currently cost the U.S. approximately $150 billion per year from direct impacts such as infrastructure damages and agricultural losses. According to NOAA, there have been 11 confirmed weather events with losses exceeding $1 billion already in 2024. Healthcare costs, which are not calculated into the direct impacts, are also skyrocketing. For example, Americans’ healthcare costs related to heat, the deadliest extreme weather event, already total an estimated $1 billion each summer. Moreover, Americans are feeling the consequences of climate change at home. Insurance companies are raising rates on property insurance and pulling out of states without warning, from Florida to Iowa to California, as the economic risk of weather events makes insuring these markets increasingly costly.

Despite the known financial impacts of climate change, H.R. 8773 disregards these risks and would expose Americans to unnecessary and avoidable economic hardship. This bill shields companies from disclosing material risks, including climate-related risks. It impedes efforts by federal agencies to understand their own contractors’ climate-related financial risks and greenhouse gas emissions, further exposing the federal government to climate impacts. It politicizes the retirement savings and investment plan for federal employees and uniformed service members by preventing investments in mutual funds that consider environmental, social, and governance criteria, even if those funds deliver the best returns. It blocks a series of executive orders that strengthen climate resilience, accelerate the transition to clean energy, and promote environmental justice and public health. It bars the government from updating its outdated cost-benefit analysis framework to reflect modern economic data (like growth, discount rates, and methods for estimating unquantified values) as agencies promulgate new rules and regulations. The provisions in H.R. 8773 willfully ignore the cost of climate change and leave American taxpayers footing a growing bill.

Poison pill riders such as these and the many exclusionary and discriminatory riders in this bill were removed from the final FY24 FSGG bill just a few months ago; by going down this path again, we fear Congress is wasting valuable time that could be better spent producing bipartisan legislation that has a realistic chance of becoming law.

Again, we urge you to REJECT H.R. 8773, the FY25 Financial Services and General Government appropriations bill, which would jeopardize the financial stability of all Americans as climate change worsens.

Sincerely,

Americans for Financial Reform

Attorneys for Animals

Buffalo Field Campaign

Ceres

Chispa

Distributed Sustainability LLC

Earthjustice

Endangered Species Coalition

Environmental Defense Fund

Environmental Protection Information Center- EPIC

Ethical Capital

Friends of the Earth Action

Global Reporting Initiative (GRI)

Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy

Interfaith Power & Light

Kettle Range Conservation Group

Kids for Saving Earth

Klamath Forest Alliance

League of Conservation Voters

Natural Resources Defense Council

Oxfam America

Physicians for Social Responsibility

Public Citizen

Resource Renewal Institute

Sierra Club

Union of Concerned Scientists

Yaak Valley Forest Council

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