Policy Briefs

As Congress pushes forward on the 2025 Budget Resolution, now in the Senate, a new nationwide survey from the Rainey Center offers key insights into voter preferences on energy development, tax credits, and fiscal tradeoffs. The findings reveal strong bipartisan support for expanding domestic energy production, a preference for targeted tax domestic incentives over broad electric vehicle subsidies, and a nuanced approach to clean energy investments.

As stated in Executive Order (E.O.) 14180, published January 24, 2025, establishing a council to assess the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), there is an urgent need to drastically improve the agency’s ability to assist states with responding to and recovering from natural disasters. This memo outlines five obvious and common sense ways the U.S. Congress and DOGE can optimize FEMA, ensure better customer service for Americans, all while saving American taxpayers billions a year.

Donald Trump is once again reconfiguring Europe’s strategic outlook.

A fundamental principle of America’s representative democracy is that elected officials should reflect the will of the majority of the electorate, not just a narrow faction.

Rainey Center conducted polling to understand how voters view the carbon-border adjustment mechanism (CBAM), a policy that places a fee on dirty energy from countries with lower environmental standards than the United States. We collaborated with the Rob and Melani Walton Sustainability Solutions Service to explore voter attitudes towards a carbon border adjustment mechanism.