Republican Rep. Mike Kelly of Pennsylvania, a staunch critic of President Joe Biden’s anti-inflation bill, used the law to obtain a grant to install solar panels at one of his car dealerships.
The US Department of Agriculture gave a Mike Kelly Automotive Group car dealership in Uniontown a grant of nearly $315,000 to install a 261.9 kilowatt solar system, according to Erie Times-Newsthe local news outlet that was first to report on the grant on Monday. According to the USDA, the grant is expected to save the company $23,700 annually in energy costs.
The USDA distributed the grant through its Rural Energy for America Program (REAP). The program has been in existence since 2018, but the Inflation Reduction Act added an additional $1 billion to the program, dramatically expanding its scope. The federal government then announced that it would distribute this money in the form of grants to rural businesses over the course of 2023 and 2024.
In his official statement following the passage of the law, Kelly said: mocked the legislation The law made these subsidies possible under the name “Inflation Reduction Act” and accused it of being “full of bad policies and wasteful spending that will ultimately worsen inflation, expand government, and hurt the middle class.”
His office singled out the bill’s climate provisions as harmful in bullet points accompanying the statement. “The bill provides $375 billion for so-called ‘climate change’ legislation, which includes $7,500 tax breaks for wealthy Americans on electric vehicle (EV) purchases,” his office said.
When asked how this grant fits with Kelly’s opposition to the IRA, Kelly spokesman Matt Knoedler referred HuffPost to the statement he provided to the Erie Times-News.
“Representative Kelly’s energy policy has always taken a comprehensive approach,” said Knoedler. “In addition, Representative Kelly does not play an active role in the day-to-day operations of the family business.”
In his Financial Disclosure 2022Kelly reported an ownership interest in the Mike Kelly Automotive Group valued between $50,001 and $100,000 and a salary of just under $30,000 from the company. Kelly also reported a “debenture” from the company valued between $500,001 and $1 million.
Mike Kelly Toyota, the dealership that received the grant, is in Republican Rep. Guy Reschenthaler’s district, south of the Erie district that Kelly represents.
Kelly has represented northwestern Pennsylvania since 2011 and has not faced a close re-election battle since 2018. Former President Donald Trump won Kelly’s current district, Pennsylvania’s 16th, by nearly 21 percentage points in 2020.
This year, Preston Nouri, a 25-year-old Defense Department legislative analyst, is the Democratic candidate running against Kelly.
Nouri called on Kelly to return the money his family’s company received. “Mike Kelly is once again showing his true colors,” Nouri said in a statement. “For over 13 years, he has been caught time and again with his hand in the cookie jar, taking taxpayer money to enrich himself while working against the interests of the people he is supposed to represent.”
Kelly was already under fire for opposing student debt forgiveness after she accepted nearly $1 million in Paycheck Protection Program loans during the COVID-19 pandemic that were then forgiven. “PPP loans are meant to be forgiven,” Kelly posted the following on X in August 2022. “Student loans don’t exist. Big difference!”
Kelly is also a staunch Trump ally, advocating for the rights of people arrested during the January 6, 2021 riots at the U.S. Capitol. During a debate on the 2022 general election, he condemned the alleged mistreatment of the January 6 defendants, asking, “Is this America?”
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