The California Energy Commission on Monday ordered Golden State Wind to hand over records about its deal with the Trump administration to voluntarily terminate its lease for a floating offshore wind project off the Central Coast, opening a new legal and political front in the intensifying clash between the state’s clean-energy targets and the White House’s fossil-fuel agenda.
The administrative subpoena, the first of its kind from a state agency, demands documentation of the company’s agreement with the Department of the Interior to accept a payment in exchange for abandoning the wind lease. David Hochschild, chair of the California Energy Commission, sharply criticized the administration’s strategy.
“The Trump administration is recklessly spending billions of taxpayer dollars on backroom deals that would turn back the clock on innovation,” Hochschild said in a statement. “Californians deserve immediate answers about the nature of this payout. Taxpayer dollars should be used to build a sustainable energy future, not to pay to make projects disappear.”
The payment to Golden State Wind, announced last week, is part of a broader Department of the Interior program that has already committed nearly $2 billion to end three offshore wind projects. In March, the administration disclosed a $1 billion deal with the French company TotalEnergies that essentially refunds its leases off North Carolina and New York, with the stipulation that the money be reinvested in fossil fuels. The two latest agreements, covering Golden State Wind and the New Jersey–New York project Bluepoint Wind, involve nearly $900 million in reimbursements under the same condition.
Both Golden State and Bluepoint are co-owned by Ocean Winds, a joint venture of EDP Renewables and the French energy giant Engie. Ocean Winds declined to comment on Monday, citing a policy against discussing open or potential litigation.
The Trump administration has defended the outlays as a correction, arguing that offshore wind was only economically viable when propped up by massive taxpayer subsidies. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum has said the leases, which were bid for in 2022 under former President Joe Biden, saddled companies with a product that had no free-market value. But court rulings have thwarted President Trump’s attempts to block the projects through executive action, pushing the administration toward the buyout approach.
California officials see the subpoena as a necessary step toward litigation to protect the state’s renewable-energy investments. A letter from Attorney General Rob Bonta to Golden State Wind makes clear that the state “anticipates potential litigation involving the federal government and parties to lease buyouts impacting California’s energy needs and offshore wind programs.” The state has already invested about $100 million to support offshore wind development and sees the termination of the Golden State project as a direct threat to its climate progress.
“This investigation sets the stage for legal action from California to safeguard renewable energy, as well as the thousands of jobs and millions of dollars of investment the state was counting on,” said Eddie Ahn, executive director of Brightline Defense, an environmental justice nonprofit that advocates for offshore wind.
In Washington, Democrats on Capitol Hill are mounting their own inquiries. U.S. Reps. Jared Huffman of California, the top Democrat on the House Natural Resources Committee, and Jamie Raskin, the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, have demanded documents related to the TotalEnergies agreement. The parallel probes reflect growing concern among lawmakers from both chambers over the Department of the Interior’s cash-for-climate-projects approach.