Washington, D.C. — As Americans struggle with soaring electricity costs, the American Economic Liberties Project today released a new policy brief laying out how elected officials at all levels of government can take direct action to address this crisis by intervening in utility rate cases.

“Members of Congress and state lawmakers do not have to sit on the sidelines as their constituents struggle with soaring electricity prices,” said Marissa Gillett, Senior Fellow at the American Economic Liberties Project “Electricity prices are ultimately determined in rate cases that are opaque and largely inaccessible to the public—resulting in provably excessive rate hikes and utility profits. Our new brief gives elected officials at all levels the information they need to formally intervene in the process, and apply pressure against rate hikes that are more difficult to defend under real scrutiny. As Rep. Josh Riley has demonstrated, this can be an effective way to upend the politics-as-usual of utility financial extraction.”

From 2020 to late 2024, investor-owned utilities, which deliver power to 70 percent of Americans, increased residential electricity rates 49 percent above inflation. A quarter of U.S. households have been unable to pay their utility bill at least once in the last twelve months. This is in part because regulators are granting investor-owned utilities substantially higher rates of return than they legally should be, as an Economic Liberties analysis showed in January.

While federal and state lawmakers should consider legislation to tackle this structural driver of utility costs, they can provide immediate relief to their constituents by intervening in rate cases. These processes are technically open to the public, but as the brief makes clear, in reality it is challenging for ratepayers to effectively advocate against price increases. The public cannot participate in hearings where expert witnesses are cross-examined and rates of returns are negotiated. Moreover, in the majority of states, public comment is not even formally considered by the state regulator in its decision-making process. Even when it is, utilities outmuscle ratepayers by spending freely to pay for legal counsel, private research, and expert testimony to support the utility’s request to raise prices.

This is where so-called “intervenors” can come in. By becoming intervenors, elected officials can use their resources to follow utility paper trails, submit testimony, and question the utility and witnesses directly—all while bringing greater public scrutiny to the case, as New York Rep. Josh Riley did this summer. The brief provides information on how to keep track of rate cases and state processes for applying to become an intervenor.

Read the Governing op-ed on the brief, “An Underused Opportunity for Elected Officials to Keep the Utility Bills Down” here.

Read the full guide here.

Learn more about Economic Liberties here.

###

The American Economic Liberties Project works to ensure America’s system of commerce is structured to advance, rather than undermine, economic liberty, fair commerce, and a secure, inclusive democracy. Economic Liberties believes true economic liberty means entrepreneurs and businesses large and small succeed on the merits of their ideas and hard work; commerce empowers consumers, workers, farmers, and engineers instead of subjecting them to discrimination and abuse from financiers and monopolists; international trade arrangements that promote promote balanced trade and benefit workers, farmers and small businesses; and wealth is broadly distributed to support equitable political power.