Join us on Capitol Hill to rally for a national data center moratorium!
Data centers have become a national crisis, threatening our air, water, democracy, and pocketbooks. That’s why we need national action from members of Congress all across the country.
Join us for a rally with Rep. Jim McGovern and other members of Congress, and to deliver thousands of petitions demanding a national data center moratorium.
If you’re traveling from outside the city, please identify if you have a car and are willing to lead a carpool! Please also indicate if you can stay after the rally to deliver petitions and letters to members of Congress.
This event is sponsored by the Stop Data Centers Coalition: Indiana Citizens Action Coalition, North Carolina Environmental Justice Network, Pennsylvania Physicians for Social Responsibility, Food & Water Watch, GreenLatinos, Media Justice, Our Revolution, Progressive Democrats of America, and Third Act.
Location
House Triangle
New Jersey Avenue Southeast & Southeast Drive
Join us to build support on Capitol Hill to protect East Potomac Park and Hains Point.
The Office of Senator Ankit Jain, WABA, and Save East Po, in conjunction with several other organizations, are organizing a Capitol Hill lobbying day on Thursday, November 12th to oppose any additional funding to the National Park Service which could assist the Trump Administration’s harmful actions impacting East Potomac Park. Sign up if you are interested in joining*—there will meeting shifts available in both the morning and afternoon, or join us for the full day!
Join us when UUSJ hosts a briefing on S. 5653, the Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act (BAAJA) of 2026 in collaboration with friends from the People vs Fossil Fuels coalition and the UU Climate Justice Coalition.
This level set briefing will summarize the impacts of the bill, its deregulatory features, and give guidance on how best to engage Congress during the Lame Duck. A vote in the Senate is expected on Monday, November 9.
UUSJ Opposes BAAJA. We find the tradeoff being proffered too steep a price, and we love our neighbors too much to remain silent or inactive. See the UU Joint Statement, on this matter for our position.
Speakers will include:
Erik Schlenker-Goodrich, Executive Director, Western Environmental Law Center
Data center construction has enormously expanded in scale and number over the past few years, and is closely tied to the fossil fuel industry, military and defense industries, and cryptocurrency mining. Data centers are primarily being built on or in proximity to Tribal Nations and Indigenous communities, rural and agricultural communities, and affordable housing.*
Through presentations from and conversation with our featured speakers, we will draw out the connections between the expansion of data centers, mineral extraction, land and water defense, farming, and food systems.
Speakers:
Esperanza Chairez
Selah Goodson Bell (No Landover Data Center Group)
Not Our Farm espera con entusiasmo organizar una conversación sobre cómo resistir la construcción de centros de datos desde una perspectiva de soberanía alimentaria y sistemas alimentarios. Escucharemos a organizadores y agricultores que están trabajando para detener la construcción de centros de datos en sus respectivas comunidades.
La construcción de centros de datos ha aumentado enormemente en escala y número en los últimos años, y está estrechamente vinculada con la industria de los combustibles fósiles, la industria militar y de defensa y la minería de criptomonedas. Los centros de datos se están construyendo principalmente en territorios de Naciones Tribales y comunidades indígenas, así como en comunidades rurales y agrícolas y en zonas cercanas a viviendas económicas.
A través de las presentaciones de nuestros ponentes invitades y de la conversación con elles, exploraremos las conexiones entre la expansión de los centros de datos, la extracción de minerales, la defensa de la tierra y el agua, la agricultura y los sistemas alimentarios.
Trump, and the data center/AI and oil & gas lobbyists cooked up a bill to gut our nation’s foundational environmental and historic preservation laws. Chuck Schumer just voted to advance it in the Senate, even as Trump taunted him. This is a dirty deal to allow development of everything from more data centers and gas pipelines to ice detention centers and mining.
Schumer’s daughter works for Open AI. AI and data center developers badly want this bill because people nationwide are revolting against data centers - and stopping their construction. They need this bill to help trample local opposition. Schumer’s always raised huge money from wall street and tech companies, in addition to his blatant personal conflict.
Now he’s advanced a bill that takes us back several decades by gutting foundational environmental and historic preservation laws: the National Environmental Policy Act, Historic Preservation Act, Clean Water Act and Endangered Species Act. These are the laws people use to prevent horrificly bad environmental projects like hyperscale data centers. Read our bill memo here to learn more.
Join us and other grassroots groups to show Schumer we won’t take this betrayal lying down. We’ll be outside his building at 6 pm to tell Schumer he sold us out, and warn Jeffries not to follow Schumer’s deceitful example.
Please join Citizens’ Climate Lobby and Dream.org on Tuesday, November 10, for a congressional briefing on the Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act (BAAJA). With Jenifer Tyler, CCL SVP of Government Affairs, former Deputy Chief of Staff, Rep. John Rotko (R-N.Y.).
On Tuesday, November 10, at 10:30 a.m., U.S. Senator Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.), Chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works (EPW) Committee, will hold a hearing to consider the nomination of Justin Schwab to be Assistant Administrator for the Office of Air and Radiation at the Environmental Protection Agency.
Nominee:
Justin Schwab, to be Assistant Administrator for the Office of Air and Radiation of the Environmental Protection Agency
Justin Schwab is the founder of CGCN Law, a law practice in DC focusing on environmental, energy, and administrative law. He served as Deputy General Counsel at EPA from 2017 through 2019. Prior to that, he practiced administrative law at BakerHostetler’s DC Office. He clerked for the Second Circuit and the Utah Supreme Court, and has a law degree from Yale and a PhD in Classics from Berkeley. He had been serving as general counsel for the White House Council on Environmental Quality before moving in July to be a senior advisor to EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin.
Before joining the administration, Schwab was an attorney at Baker & Hostetler LLP, where his clients included the utility giant Southern Co., according to his financial disclosure form (Greenwire, May 8).
Schwab’s other industry clients included construction equipment manufacturer Caterpillar Inc.; Scotts Co. LLC, which makes lawn care products; metal producer Mississippi Silicon LLC; and steelmaker Big River Steel LLC.
Danielle K. Thumann Severs is Senior Counsel, Chairman Brendan Carr, Federal Communications Commission. Before that, she spent a year in the private sector where she led on state and local government relations for Crown Castle, a nationwide telecommunications infrastructure provider. Before her first stint with Commissioner Carr’s office in 2021, Severs was an Associate Attorney in the Washington, D.C., office of Wilkinson Barker Knauer. After attending the University of Virginia for her undergraduate degree, Severs earned her J.D. cum laude from the Catholic University of America’s Columbus School of Law where she was Associate Editor of the Catholic University Law Review. She also earned a certificate from the Columbus School of Law’s Law & Technology Institute. She has also worked for Republican FCC commissioner Michael O’Rielly and several telecom trade associations, including the Wireline Competition Bureau, the National Cable and Telecommunications Association, Telecommunications Law Professionals, and CTIA-The Wireless Association.
Robert Steinau is currently NASA’s Assistant Inspector General for Investigations and the acting NASA Inspector General. A former Marine and then Secret Service agent who served on the detail for Vice President Dick Cheney, Steinau served for ten years in the leadership of the NASA cyber crimes division before joining the NASA IG office in 2021.
Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee
The Farm Credit Administration currently has only one member, Jeffery Hall.
Nominees:
Gregory Ibach, of Nebraska, to be Undersecretary for Trade and Foreign Affairs, Department of Agriculture
Carl Bednarski of Michigan, to be a member of the Farm Credit Administration, for a term expiring May 21, 2034
John Grunewald II of Oklahoma, to be a member of the Farm Credit Administration, for a term expiring May 21, 2032
James Russell “Rus” Middleton of Virginia, to be a member of the Farm Credit Administration, for a term expiring Oct. 13, 2030.
The owner of 11 Milliron Ranch in Sumner, Neb., Greg Ibach served as director of the Nebraska Department of Agriculture from 2005 to 2017, and served as USDA Undersecretary for Marketing and Regulatory Programs from 2017 to 2025. His wife Teresa Ibach is a Republican member of the Nebraska legislature.
John Grunewald II retired in 2023 after 43 years in the Farm Credit System, including 31 years as president and CEO of Farm Credit of Western Oklahoma. His nomination for the seat ending in 2030 was withdrawn on September 17 but resubmitted on September 28 for the seat ending in 2032.
James Russell “Rus” Middleton has served as the Associate Director of the Office of Congressional and Public Affairs at the FCA since May 2009, and was a Democratic Senior Professional Staff Member for the House Committee on Agriculture (1997–2006). He also spent ten years as a Legislative Assistant to U.S. Representative Charles W. Stenholm (D-Texas).
Senate Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry Committee
But what are they demanding from the next Congress and the next Administration?
Join elected leaders, strategists, pollsters, advocates, and experts the week after Election Day to unpack the issues and messages that moved voters in the midterms and what that means for policy agendas, congressional oversight, and the ideas primary. Popular Mandate is where we turn the lessons of 2026 into a roadmap for the future.
10:00 AM
Morning Welcome: Lindsay Owens, Groundwork Action
10:05 AM
Opening Keynote: Sen. Elizabeth Warren (MA)
10:20 AM
Panel: Making Sense of the Midterms
Featuring Brian Fallon, Leah Greenberg, Xochitl Hinojosa, and Rebecca Katz. Moderated by David Freedlander, New York Magazine. Introduced by Maya Wiley, The Leadership Conference for Civil and Human Rights.
11:15 AM – Break
11:35 AM*
Welcome Back: Joel Payne, MoveOn Civic Action
11:40 AM *
Pollster Presentations
Melissa Toufanian, Navigator Research
David Shor, Blue Rose Research
12:00 PM
Remarks: President April Verrett, SEIU
12:15 PM
Remarks: Bishop Leah Daughtry, Power Rising Action Fund
12:30 PM – Lunch Break
1:30 PM
Afternoon Welcome: Rep.-Elect Brad Lander (NY)
1:35 PM
Video Message from Mayor Zohran Mamdani (New York City)
1:40 PM
Panel: Taking on Big Tech
Featuring Rep. Becca Balint (VT), Rep.-Elect William Lawrence (MI), and Alex Bores. Moderated by Elizabeth Wilkins
2:15 PM
Panel: Taking on Corruption
Featuring Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (RI), Rep. Jamie Raskin (MD), and Rep. Greg Casar (TX). Moderated by Lisa Gilbert, Public Citizen
2:45 PM
Fireside Chat: Sen. Chris Van Hollen with Ali Vitali, MS NOW
3:00 PM
Panel: Taking on Health Care Costs
Featuring Reps.-Elect Adam Hamawy (NJ) and Donavan McKinney (MI). Moderated by Nidhi Hegde, Fight Corporate Monopolies. Introduced by Sen. Andy Kim (NJ).
3:30 PM – Afternoon Break
3:45 PM
Remarks: Rep. Ro Khanna (CA)
3:50 PM
Remarks: Rep.-Elect Daniel Biss (IL)
3:55 PM
Panel: Meet the New Members
Featuring Reps.-Elect Matt Little (MN), Katy Padilla Stout (TX), and Randy Villegas (CA). Moderated by Tara McGowan, COURIER. Introduced by Sara Cheiffo, League of Conservation Voters.
