User:Louis/H.R. 9419 Power and Water for Families Act

H.R. 9419, the Power and Water for Families Act of 2026, would add two ratemaking standards to section 111(d) of the Public Utility Regulatory Policies Act of 1978, the first requiring that a large-load customer pay the full, incremental cost of any generation, transmission, or distribution upgrade built to serve it, & would create two 30 percent investment tax credits. Representative Michael Baumgartner of Washington's 5th congressional district introduced it on June 24, 2026, & it was referred to the Committee on Ways and Means and to the Committee on Energy and Commerce. A July 8, 2026 post by Dr. Linda Gunshefski states that the bill "would strip away the right of local governments to place moratoriums" on data centers; the introduced text carries no preemption clause & no provision touching land use, zoning, siting, or permitting, & its single reference to moratoria sits in section 3, a statement of the policy of Congress that binds no one.

Bill provisions

Section 101 adds paragraph (22) to PURPA section 111(d), codified at 16 U.S.C. 2621(d). Its first subparagraph fixes who pays for the wires & the generation:

A rate charged, or entered into, by an electric utility for providing electric service to a large-load customer shall be designed to recover from the large-load customer the full, incremental cost of any generation, transmission, or distribution upgrade necessary to serve the load of such large-load customer ...

Subparagraph (B) requires the utility to collect "financial assurances or contributions to cover the cost of such upgrade" before it builds. Subparagraph (C) sets the trigger: a non-residential retail electric customer whose facilities sit behind a single point of interconnection & have, in the aggregate, a peak electric demand of 100 megawatts or more at a single site or campus.

H.R. 9419 defines a large-load customer as a non-residential retail electric customer with facilities behind a single point of interconnection and "a peak electric demand of 100 megawatts or more at a single site or campus".

Section 102 adds paragraph (23), which directs each electric utility to consider mechanisms under which a large-load customer is encouraged or required to develop, acquire, finance, or dedicate new generation sufficient to serve its own projected load. The paragraph then gives the state the steering wheel. Subparagraph (C) permits implementation through "any other mechanism determined appropriate by the State regulatory authority or nonregulated electric utility", & subparagraph (E) says nothing in the paragraph may be read to require a state "to mandate the physical allocation of generating capacity" or a uniform percentage set-aside. Section 104 amends PURPA section 124, 16 U.S.C. 2634, as a date-reference conforming amendment for the paragraph (22) standard.

The tax title is where the money moves. Section 105 creates a new Internal Revenue Code section 48G worth 30 percent of the qualified additive investment, limited to capacity that exceeds a covered facility's own projected peak demand, is contracted out to a load-serving entity, & does not exceed 50 percent of that projected peak demand. A project qualifies only if it does "not shift generation, transmission, distribution, interconnection, stranded, or other infrastructure costs attributable to the covered large-load facility to existing residential, agricultural, small business, or other existing customers", & the credit expires for anything placed in service more than 10 years after enactment. Section 201 creates section 48F, a separate 30 percent credit for water reuse projects that install an onsite recycling system, swap freshwater for recycled municipal water, or build out a municipal recycling system.

PURPA consider-and-determine procedure

A PURPA section 111(d) standard obliges a state to hold a proceeding, not to adopt a rule. Under 16 U.S.C. 2621 each state regulatory authority & each nonregulated electric utility must consider every standard in subsection (d) & make a determination whether implementing it is appropriate, & that consideration must be made after public notice and hearing. The same subsection then says what the state may do with the answer:

Nothing in this subsection prohibits any State regulatory authority or nonregulated electric utility from making any determination that it is not appropriate to implement any such standard, pursuant to its authority under otherwise applicable State law.

FERC v. Mississippi, 456 U.S. 742 (1982), is the controlling authority on that point:

Despite the extent and detail of the federal proposals, however, no state authority or nonregulated utility is required to adopt or implement the specified rate design or regulatory standards.

The same subsection provides that for purposes of that consideration and determination, & of any court review of it under 16 U.S.C. 2633, "the purposes of this chapter supplement otherwise applicable State law". That reach is bounded by 2633 itself. Subsection (a) withdraws the jurisdiction of the courts of the United States over any action arising under the subchapter except in narrow cases, & subsection (c)(1) routes review of a determination to state court:

Any person (including the Secretary) may obtain review of any determination made under subchapter I or II or under this subchapter with respect to any electric utility ... in the appropriate State court ...

Review runs against the state regulatory authority that made the determination, & no provision reaches a municipal ordinance.

16 U.S.C. 2627(b) closes the other door, the one an implied-preemption argument would have to walk through:

Nothing in this chapter prohibits any State regulatory authority or nonregulated electric utility from adopting, pursuant to State law, any standard or rule affecting electric utilities which is different from any standard established by this subchapter.

Subsection (b) of 16 U.S.C. 2627, headed "State authority", provides that nothing in the chapter prohibits a State regulatory authority or nonregulated electric utility from adopting a different standard under State law.

Section 103 of H.R. 9419, headed "Obligations to consider and determine", supplies the clock & a grandfather clause. Each authority has 1 year from enactment to commence consideration or set a hearing date on the paragraph (22) standard, & 2 years to complete the consideration & make the determination on paragraphs (22) & (23). A new subsection (i) makes subsections (b) & (c) inapplicable where, before enactment, the state has already implemented the standard or a comparable standard, its regulatory authority or nonregulated utility has already conducted a proceeding to consider it, or the state legislature has already voted on it. A commission that runs the hearing on schedule & determines the standard is not appropriate for its utilities has satisfied the statute in full. Nothing in the bill reaches a city council's permit counter, because a building permit for a data center is not a retail electric rate & no section of the bill purports to touch one.

Moratorium claim

Dr. Linda Gunshefski published the claim on her Substack, Pulse Check, on July 8, 2026, under the title "Baumgartner's Bill: AI Data Center Trojan Horse":

... HR 9419 would strip away the right of local governments to place moratoriums on data centers being placed in their communities.

The introduced text does not do this. The word "moratoria" appears once in the bill, in section 3(2), which reads that as a matter of the policy of Congress:

the United States should address demonstrated and localized infrastructure impacts through targeted, evidence-based measures rather than broad restrictions, blanket moratoria, or policies that impede responsible development

Section 3 of H.R. 9419 sets out the policy of Congress, including that the United States should address infrastructure impacts through targeted, evidence-based measures rather than "broad restrictions, blanket moratoria, or policies that impede responsible development".

A statement of the policy of Congress creates no rule of decision, confers no cause of action, & displaces no local ordinance. The Congressional Research Service, addressing "sense of Congress" provisions, states that ordinarily a statement that something "should" be done "is merely precatory, and creates no legal rights", & that such language can resolve ambiguities in the operative sections of the same law. H.R. 9419's operative sections amend PURPA ratemaking standards & the Internal Revenue Code, & none of them addresses land use, so section 3(2) has no ambiguity about local moratorium authority to resolve. The bill's own findings run the other way: section 2(4) states that state regulatory authorities, nonregulated electric utilities, regional transmission organizations, & other relevant entities "should retain flexibility to implement solutions appropriate to the communities they serve".

The same post says the bill "completely reclassifies artificial intelligence infrastructure" as a "national security" issue & gives the federal government "veto power over communities who choose to limit where these massive facilities are built". The phrase "national security" appears once in H.R. 9419, in the section 2(1) finding that artificial intelligence has the potential to "enhance the national security of the United States". No operative section designates data centers as national security assets or critical infrastructure, & no section creates a federal veto over anything.

The post also states that the bill "explicitly stops short of requiring them to pay for it". Paragraph (22)(A) uses "shall be designed to recover" & paragraph (22)(B) uses "shall require", both mandatory as drafted; what is discretionary is whether a state adopts the standard at all, which is a feature of every PURPA standard rather than of this one. Baumgartner's own June 25, 2026 statement announcing the bill says "No data center should be forced on a local community."

Congressman Michael Baumgartner's announcement of the Power and Water for Families Act of 2026 quotes him saying "No data center should be forced on a local community."

Spokane and the Avista request

The claim landed in a city that had just done the thing the claim says the bill would forbid. Council Members Paul Dillon, Sarah Dixit, & Kate Telis introduced an ordinance on June 10, 2026 imposing an immediate one-year citywide moratorium on the acceptance, processing, review, & approval of building permit applications for new computer data centers. Mayor Lisa Brown said the city "does not currently have the necessary framework to site and permit data centers".

The City of Spokane announcement names Council Members Paul Dillon, Sarah Dixit, and Kate Telis as introducing an ordinance imposing an immediate one-year citywide moratorium on building permit applications for new computer data centers.

The council approved it 6 to 1 on the night of June 22, 2026, with Councilman Michael Cathcart the sole vote in opposition, arguing that the moratorium would clumsily ban projects the city supported, including a long-planned aerospace research and development center. The adopted language blocks only projects using more than 25 megavolt-amperes. Weeks earlier, Avista had been approached by a potential 500 megawatt data center, a demand The Spokesman-Review reported would equal half the combined power used by all residential & business customers in Spokane County; the utility paused negotiations with that customer, & has maintained that adding a large-load data center would not affect existing ratepayers' energy costs. KHQ reported that the bill's announcement came as the council passed the ordinance.

Comparison with the SHIELD Act

H.R. 7066, the Stopping Hikes In Electricity from Large Load Demands Act, was introduced on January 14, 2026 by Representative Levin with seven original cosponsors & referred to the Committee on Energy and Commerce. It amends the same statutory provision H.R. 9419 amends. Its standard declares that "Large load facilities shall be considered a class of electric consumers" & then requires each serving utility to fully recover from that class all costs of any generation, transmission, or distribution upgrade made to meet the class's demand, including where a facility ceases operations or uses less energy than projected. Its threshold is a peak demand exceeding 75 megawatts, & like H.R. 9419 it gives states 2 years to complete the consideration & determination under PURPA section 112.

The Gunshefski post holds up bills including the PRICE Act & the SHIELD Act as legislation that would "legally mandate that tech companies pay 100% of their grid network upgrades" in contrast to H.R. 9419. Both bills deliver their standard through the same consider-and-determine machinery of PURPA sections 111 & 112, so neither mandates anything against a state that declines. Documented differences include the 75 megawatt versus 100 megawatt threshold, recovery from the large-load class as a whole versus from the individual customer, & a reporting requirement: the SHIELD Act makes each authority report its process & reasoning to the House Energy and Commerce Committee & the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, which H.R. 9419 does not. H.R. 7066's paragraph (23), on grid reliability for large load facilities, directs each utility to prioritize requests whose operator agrees to employ demand-reduction features & to use, in the bill's words:

zero-emission electric energy generated onsite or procured within the same balancing authority through a power purchase agreement to meet all of the demand of the large load facility for electric energy

H.R. 9419's paragraph (23) directs consideration of additive generation for the benefit of other customers. Only H.R. 9419 requires financial assurances before the utility builds.

Express preemption in H.R. 5388

Baumgartner introduced H.R. 5388, the American Artificial Intelligence Leadership and Uniformity Act, on September 16, 2025, nine months before H.R. 9419; it was referred to the Committee on Science, Space, and Technology & eleven additional committees. Its section 6 is headed "State law preemption; temporary moratorium" & reads:

Except as provided in paragraph (2), no State or political subdivision thereof may enforce, during the 5-year period beginning on the date of the enactment of this Act, any law or regulation of that State or a political subdivision thereof limiting, restricting, or otherwise regulating artificial intelligence models, artificial intelligence systems, or automated decision systems entered into interstate commerce.

Section 6 of H.R. 5388 bars any State or political subdivision, except as provided in its paragraph (2), from enforcing a law regulating artificial intelligence models, artificial intelligence systems, or automated decision systems for a 5-year period after enactment.

That is the shape of an express preemption provision: a named class of governments, a named prohibition on enforcement, & a fixed term. Its reach is Artificial intelligence models, AI systems, & automated decision systems, not data center siting. H.R. 9419 contains no sentence of this shape at any scope.

Drafting defects in the introduced text

Three artifacts sit in the text as introduced. Proposed PURPA paragraph (23) runs subparagraphs (A), (B), (C), then (E) & (F); there is no subparagraph (D). Section 201(a) amends "Subpart E of part IV of subchapter A of chapter 1" while its own clerical amendment at section 201(c) amends the table of sections for subpart D. Section 105(a) inserts the new section 48G "after section 48F", but the section 48F it follows is created by section 201, in a later title of the same bill. All three appear the same way in the Government Publishing Office print of the bill as introduced.

In the text of H.R. 9419 as introduced, subparagraph (C) on flexible implementation is followed directly by subparagraph (E) on mandatory resource allocation, with no subparagraph (D).

Legislative status

H.R. 9419 was referred to two committees on June 24, 2026 & carries zero cosponsors.

See also

• Utility remote control of smart thermostats
• National Grid USA smart meter data collection in New York and Massachusetts