Casey, Others Upset with Stimulus Wind Funding - Propose "Buy America" Provision
US Senators Bob Casey of Pennsylvania, Chuck Schumer of New York, Sherrod Brown of Ohio and Jon Tester of Montana announced Wednesday a new initiative to require the "Buy America" provision of the stimulus to be applied to all programs under the jurisdiction of the legislation, not just the government ones, arguing that too much of the money spent so far has gone to create jobs overseas.

A study done by the Investigative Reporting Workshop found that 79 percent of the $2 billion in clean-energy grants allocated since Sept. 1, 2009, has gone to foreign wind companies.

"We are demanding the Obama administration suspend this program immediately ... [and] indefinitely," Schumer said. "We are sending a letter to Secretary Geithner asking him to halt all payouts for this program until we in Congress can go back and fix this law."

The senators' efforts garnered praise from several union leaders. "Energy is critical to America's future, and we should ensure that domestic manufacturers help fuel the future development of this sector," said United Steelworkers President Leo W. Gerard.

The Obama administration and wind-energy advocates strongly disputed the criticism by Casey and the other Democrats, saying that most of the jobs under the Energy Department program have been created in the United States, despite the dominance of foreign manufacturers in the green-technology sector.

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