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Energy and permitting policy, read from the public record.

Register entry No. 0037Floor orderH.R. 2347 · S. 5653

Senate takes up H.R. 2347 after 73-25 cloture vote; Capito substitute SA 6883 carries revised permitting text

The Senate invoked cloture on the motion to proceed November 9 and agreed to proceed 62-21 on November 10. Majority Leader Thune then called up SA 6883, a full-text substitute that rewrites S. 5653 as introduced, adding a nuclear licensing title and FERC authority over RTO governance.

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Summary

Seventy-three senators voted on November 9, 2026, to invoke cloture on the motion to proceed to H.R. 2347, against 25 opposed, clearing the three-fifths threshold under Senate rules [1, 3]. The next evening the Senate agreed to the motion to proceed, 62-21, and Majority Leader John Thune called up amendment No. 6883, a substitute “in the nature of a substitute” offered for Sen. Shelley Moore Capito that replaces the bill’s text with the Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act of 2026 [2, 4, 5]. H.R. 2347 is officially the Survivor Justice Tax Prevention Act, a House-passed bill to exclude certain damages from gross income [4].

What the record shows

The vote breakdown

The cloture vote drew 51 Republicans, 21 Democrats and one independent in favor [1]. Twenty-three Democrats, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) voted no [1]. On the motion to proceed a day later, the yeas fell to 62 and the nays to 21, with 17 senators not voting; Rounds, Sanders and 19 Democrats were again opposed [2, 10].

What the substitute is

The Record lists SA 6883 as proposed by Thune “for Mrs. CAPITO (for herself, Mr. LEE, Mr. WHITEHOUSE, and Mr. HEINRICH)” [5]. It strikes everything after the enacting clause and inserts the permitting text in two divisions, one from the Environment and Public Works Committee and one from Energy and Natural Resources [5]. A third division, Division C, keeps the original survivor-damages tax exclusion as section 3001 [5]. That answers the vehicle question this site raised in its November 5 report on the cloture order: the permitting text now rides on H.R. 2347 by filed amendment, not only by press reporting.

How does SA 6883 differ from S. 5653?

The substitute’s table of contents lists sections that do not appear in S. 5653 as introduced on September 30 [5, 11]:

Section in SA 6883 Subject
1134 FAST-41 claims limit cut from 2 years to 150 days
1309 State wildlife action plans
1501-1504 Nuclear licensing: hearing procedures, enrichment facilities, deadline carve-outs, NRC pay authority
1601-1602 Wildfire emissions prevention; brownfields revitalization
2115 De novo court review of Natural Gas Act civil penalties
2116 FERC jurisdiction over Transmission Organization corporate governance
2117 DOE Data Center Community Assistance Program
2261 Public announcement requirements for certain DOE nuclear actions

S. 5653 had a section on the Northwest Power and Conservation Council in its FERC hiring subtitle; that section is not in the substitute’s list [5, 11]. Section 2212 is retitled from “Rights-of-way across Indian land” to “Modification of Tribal leases and rights-of-way across Indian land” [5, 11].

The project-certainty provision, section 1401, keeps its structure but moves its cutoff. Under S. 5653, agencies could not revoke, suspend or “materially alter” a permit “in effect on or after September 16, 2026,” except in listed cases [11]. SA 6883 uses November 6, 2026 [5]. The exceptions include a court order, a material breach, fraud, and harm “based on new information that was not considered” in the underlying review [5].

Provisions with direct effect on energy projects

  • NEPA litigation. New NEPA section 111 bars a claim unless it is filed within 150 days and by a party that submitted a sufficiently detailed comment [5]. Courts of appeals get original jurisdiction, and if an authorization fails NEPA, “the only remedy the court may order” is remand “without vacatur or issuance of an injunction,” with agency action due within 180 days [5]. Current FAST-41 law gives covered projects a 2-year window, which section 1134 would cut to 150 days [5, 13].
  • Transmission siting. Today, FERC “may” issue a backstop permit only in a national interest electric transmission corridor designated by the Secretary of Energy [12]. Section 2101 rewrites section 216(b) so that the Commission “shall” issue permits, after a comment period of at least 45 days, for facilities of at least 230 kilovolts that meet public-interest, consumer and reliability findings [5]. The one-year state clock would run from the date the application was filed with the state [5]. A new section 216(d)(1) bars FERC from issuing a permit inside a state except under the conditions in subsection (b)(1) [5].
  • Data center costs. Section 2107 states a congressional finding that computational load owners and operators should “bear the full cost of any electric service that they require” [5]. It also declares that rates charging them less than embedded and incremental expansion costs are not just and reasonable under sections 205 and 206 [5].
  • RTO governance. Section 2116 adds to both sections 205 and 206 that “the Commission has jurisdiction over the corporate governance of a Transmission Organization” [5].
  • Nuclear licensing. Section 1501 would let the NRC issue a construction permit or operating license “without a hearing” when no one requests one, after 30 days’ notice, and would require informal adjudicatory procedures for any hearing it holds [5]. Section 1503 exempts NRC reactor and fuel-facility licensing from the bill’s NEPA deadlines and from the one-year permit deadline in section 1403 [5].

Where it sits in the process

The bill is now the Senate’s pending business. After the 62-21 vote, Thune offered six more amendments and a motion to commit [4]. Amendments 6884 through 6887 and the motion to commit’s amendments 6888 through 6890 only change the effective date, from one to seven days after enactment, and Thune requested the yeas and nays on most of them [4]. The Daily Digest lists all of them as pending, with consideration set to resume at about noon on November 11 [6].

What comes after the motion to proceed?

The November 9 cloture vote closed debate only on the motion to proceed [3]. Thune said on November 9 that he hoped the Senate would “finish it this week” [7]. Because H.R. 2347 is a House bill, Senate passage of the substitute would send it back to the House, and both chambers must agree on the same text before it goes to the President [4, 15].

What the record does not show

  • A cloture motion on the substitute or the bill. The record through November 10 shows none filed [4, 6].
  • Votes on any amendment from other senators. Van Hollen said he would introduce amendments [8]. The Record’s pending list shows only Thune’s [6].
  • The text behind the projected savings. Floor estimates of $10 billion a year, $55 billion over ten years and $178 to $251 per household are statements, not analyses in the record [7, 10].
  • Wind and solar terms. The substitute’s project-certainty sections apply to permits generally [5]; the record cited here contains no separate White House agreement on renewable projects.
  • A House position on SA 6883. No House statement on the substitute appears in the record cited here.

Positions on the record

Sponsors. Capito told the Senate the bill would create “predictability, consistency, and finality in securing a permit” and said “we are not skirting any environmental regulations at all” [7]. Whitehouse, the Environment and Public Works Committee’s ranking Democrat, said the bill is “modeled at this point to save American customers, ratepayers, more than $10 billion per year” and that “It ends the data center freeloading, period” [7]. Lee cited a Council of Economic Advisers estimate of $178 to $251 a year in household electricity savings [10]. He said “some of the loudest voices in environmental politics in the United States are demanding that we abandon the agreement” [10].

Democrats who voted no or reserved judgment. Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) voted no on cloture and inserted a statement saying the bill “falls short of balancing those trade-offs” [8]. He objected to its Clean Water Act changes and said “the bill’s limitations on judicial review go too far, especially to the National Historic Preservation Act and the National Environmental Policy Act” [8]. He also said it does not do enough to protect the Maryland Offshore Wind project [8]. Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-Ga.) voted to proceed but wrote, “I reserve judgement on whether it merits passage pending upcoming debate and amendment” [9].

Outside groups. The National Ocean Industries Association urged the Senate to pass the bill without delay after the manager’s amendment was released, according to World Oil [14]. When the deal was announced in September, the Conservation Law Foundation’s president said it appeared to adopt a fossil fuel industry wish list, according to the Associated Press, which also reported that the Edison Electric Institute was encouraged by the streamlining provisions [15]. Neither group’s response to SA 6883 itself appears in the record this report draws on.

Reading-room questions

Questions readers bring to this record, answered from the documents cited below.

Did the Senate pass the permitting bill?
No. On November 9 the Senate invoked cloture on the motion to proceed to H.R. 2347, 73-25, and on November 10 it agreed to the motion to proceed, 62-21 [1, 2]. Those votes opened debate; a final passage vote had not been held as of the record cited here [6].
What is amendment SA 6883 to H.R. 2347?
SA 6883 is a substitute that strikes everything after the enacting clause of H.R. 2347 and inserts the Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act of 2026 [5]. Majority Leader Thune offered it for Sen. Capito, with Sens. Lee, Whitehouse and Heinrich listed as cosponsors [4, 5].
How is the substitute different from S. 5653?
SA 6883 adds sections that S. 5653 as introduced did not have, including a nuclear licensing title, a 150-day limit on FAST-41 claims, FERC jurisdiction over RTO corporate governance and a DOE data center community assistance program [5, 11]. It also moves the project-certainty cutoff date from September 16 to November 6, 2026 [5, 11].
Would the permitting bill shorten the time to sue over a NEPA review?
Yes, as written. SA 6883 bars NEPA-based claims filed more than 150 days after the authorization is published or made public, and the FAST-41 limit for covered projects would drop from 2 years to 150 days [5, 13].
Would data centers pay for their own transmission under the Senate bill?
SA 6883 states a congressional finding that computational load owners and operators should bear the full cost of the electric service and infrastructure built to serve them, and that rates charging them less than embedded and incremental costs are not just and reasonable [5].

Note on sourcing

The Congressional Record for November 11 had not been published as of this report, so the floor record cited here ends with the Senate's November 10 proceedings; any action on November 11, including any cloture motion on SA 6883 or the bill, is not reflected. The comparison of SA 6883 with S. 5653 is drawn from the section lists and selected provisions of the two texts and is not a complete line-by-line comparison. The household-savings and ratepayer-savings figures are senators' statements on the floor, attributed to the White House Council of Economic Advisers and to unnamed modeling; this report has not checked them against the underlying analyses. The National Ocean Industries Association statement is as World Oil reported it, and the Conservation Law Foundation's criticism is as the Associated Press reported it in September, before the substitute text was filed.

Sources

  1. Roll Call Vote 119th Congress, 2nd Session, Vote No. 257: On Cloture on the Motion to Proceed, H.R. 2347U.S. Senate, November 9, 2026 · senate.gov
  2. Roll Call Vote 119th Congress, 2nd Session, Vote No. 258: On the Motion to Proceed, H.R. 2347U.S. Senate, November 10, 2026 · senate.gov
  3. Congressional Record, Daily Digest (November 9, 2026), Senate, pp. D994 ff.U.S. Senate, November 9, 2026 · govinfo.gov
  4. Congressional Record, Senate (November 10, 2026): Survivor Justice Tax Prevention Act, Amendment Nos. 6883-6890 and motion to commit, pp. S5392-S5393U.S. Senate, November 10, 2026 · govinfo.gov
  5. Congressional Record, Senate (November 10, 2026), full Senate section including Text of Amendments, SA 6883U.S. Senate, November 10, 2026 · govinfo.gov
  6. Congressional Record, Daily Digest (November 10, 2026), Senate, pp. D1004 ff.U.S. Senate, November 10, 2026 · govinfo.gov
  7. Congressional Record, Senate (November 9, 2026): Legislative Session, remarks of Sens. Thune, Whitehouse and Capito, pp. S5337-S5345U.S. Senate, November 9, 2026 · govinfo.gov
  8. Congressional Record, Senate (November 9, 2026): Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act (statement of Sen. Van Hollen), p. S5345U.S. Senate, November 9, 2026 · govinfo.gov
  9. Congressional Record, Senate (November 9, 2026): H.R. 2347 (statement of Sen. Ossoff), p. S5345U.S. Senate, November 9, 2026 · govinfo.gov
  10. Congressional Record, Senate (November 10, 2026): Survivor Justice Tax Prevention Act, motion to proceed, continued (remarks of Sen. Lee; Vote No. 258), pp. S5385-S5392U.S. Senate, November 10, 2026 · govinfo.gov
  11. S. 5653, Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act of 2026 (Introduced in Senate)U.S. Senate, September 30, 2026 · govinfo.gov
  12. 16 U.S. Code § 824p, Siting of interstate electric transmission facilitiesU.S. Congress, accessed 2026-11-12 · law.cornell.edu
  13. 42 U.S. Code § 4370m-6, Litigation, judicial review, and savings provisionU.S. Congress, accessed 2026-11-12 · law.cornell.edu
  14. NOIA urges Senate to pass bipartisan permitting bill ahead of Nov. 9 cloture voteWorld Oil, November 8, 2026 · worldoil.com
  15. Senate reaches bipartisan deal on permitting bill to speed approvals of new energy projectsAssociated Press, September 30, 2026 · mynorthwest.com

Subject headings

Cross-references

Other register entries filed under the same subject headings.

  1. No. 0031 · Floor order · 7 shared headingsSenate order sets Nov. 9 cloture vote on motion to proceed to H.R. 2347, the vehicle for a permitting package
  2. No. 0033 · Data release · 2 shared headingsNERC petitions FERC to register 50-MW data centers, Docket No. RR27-1-000; comments due Nov. 20
  3. No. 0030 · Report · 2 shared headingsFERC opens scoping on Longboard LNG import terminal off Oʻahu, Docket No. PF26-10-000