Strengthen Ratepayer Protection Act (H.R.9340 / S.5028) in Committee Markup

I'm writing as a ratepayer to urge you to support the Ratepayer Protection Act (H.R. 9340 / S. 5028). These bills would help ensure that Americans are not left paying for grid upgrades driven by large data-center loads. The White House "Ratepayer Protection Pledge" is widely viewed as voluntary and non-binding, which is exactly why it has not provided reliable relief when electricity bills keep rising. A pledge without enforceable requirements can be avoided, delayed, or implemented in ways that still allow costs to be shifted back to households through utility rates. H.R. 9340 / S. 5028 addresses that shortfall directly. The legislation establishes a federal standard under PURPA requiring that, for covered large-load customers (non-residential facilities with aggregate peak demand of 100 megawatts or more at a single site/campus), utility rates must be designed to recover from those customers the full, incremental cost of generation, transmission, and distribution upgrades necessary to serve the load. It also requires financial assurances or contributions before the utility makes those upgrades, including in cases where a customer terminates an agreement or stops purchasing electricity. From a ratepayer perspective, this "teeth" matter: it creates a clear rule for cost responsibility, reduces the risk of stranded investments being recovered from general ratepayers, and makes it harder for utilities to socialize data-center-driven costs. The result should be fewer instances where households shoulder the bill while large facilities benefit from reliable power and expanded capacity. Please work to ensure that H.R. 9340 / S. 5028 is assigned to the appropriate committee for prompt consideration. I urge you to support strong, consistent implementation of this legislation at both the federal and state levels. Ratepayers deserve enforceable protections—not assurances that can disappear when costs rise.