The Ripon Society

NEWS from
THE RIPON SOCIETY
"Financial Services Committee Republicans Chairman Congressman French Hill Charts Path to Year-End Legislative Goals"
June 5, 2026

WASHINGTON, DC – House Financial Services Committee Chairman French Hill (AR-02) discussed the priorities and progress of the 119th Congress at a breakfast discussion held by the Ripon Society yesterday morning, highlighting landmark legislation on housing, digital assets, and capital formation — and outlining the committee's path to the finish line before the end of the term.

Chairman Hill opened by tracing the roots of America's financial system to Alexander Hamilton's dual legacy of commercial banking and capital markets — the foundation, he argued, that continues to define the committee's mission today.

“We understand the importance of interstate commerce and international commerce and America's place in the world by the work we do in commercial and investment banking and its related issues like housing, and housing finance. It's 20% of our economy – residential construction's a big part of our economy. It's why we put so much emphasis on and thinking about housing in this Congress.”

The Chairman, a former staffer on the Senate Banking Committee's Housing Subcommittee under Sen. John Tower (TX), reflected on his governing philosophy: build coalitions around sound policy and get to yes.

“If this is an important enough policy to change the direction of the United States, a particular policy, then we're going to get the yes. We're not going to compromise our principles.”

On legislative accomplishments, Hill pointed to several major bills the committee has moved through the House in the 119th Congress with strong bipartisan support: the CLARITY Act, the digital asset market structure bill, which passed with 78 votes including Democratic support and fulfills a commitment he made to the President; the Housing for the 21st Century Act, which passed with 390 votes — every House Democrat voting for a Republican-authored housing package; the INVEST Act, a capital formation bill passed with 302 votes; and the Main Street Capital Access Act, which he expressed hope would reach the floor soon as the centerpiece of his goal to “make community banking great again.”

On housing, Hill acknowledged the math challenge of reconciling the House bill with the version passed by the Senate, noting that differences over a proposed new HUD program and other provisions put several House members in the “no” column on the Senate text. The committee moved a carefully targeted amendment to the Senate bill, preserving the coalition while making the minimum changes necessary to hold the House majority.

“This is a win for the American people, for the homebuilding industry, for people trying to build their first home, for people who want to cut costs, who want to cut bureaucracy, who want to beat local zoning commissions,” Hill said. “The President has asked the Senate to pass our bill, and he'll sign it.”

On digital assets, Hill praised the Senate's work under Senators Tim Scott (SC) and John Boozman (AR) to move the CLARITY Act forward, noting that Senate Banking and Senate Agriculture committees are working to reconcile their respective titles into a unified bill. He expressed confidence the bill could reach the President's desk before the August recess.

Hill also offered an endorsement of Kevin Warsh as the incoming Federal Reserve Chair, describing him as well-prepared for the role and likely to bring a narrower, more disciplined focus to the Fed's core mission of price stability — including closer attention to the Fed's balance sheet and the role of its regional reserve banks.

“He comes at the job at the perfect time with perfect background, and he knows quite clearly what needs to happen. I'm proud to see the Senate confirm him now.”

On the question of building bipartisan coalitions with a narrow House majority, Hill offered practical counsel: start with good policy, break legislation into small pieces rather than sweeping omnibus packages, find Democratic co-sponsors on individual bills, and ensure members develop Senate companions early in the process.

“Be principled, policy-oriented, break it down into small pieces, find bipartisan partners,” he said.

The Ripon Society is a public policy organization that was founded in 1962 and takes its name from the town where the Republican Party was born in 1854 – Ripon, Wisconsin. One of the main goals of The Ripon Society is to promote the ideas and principles that have made America great and contributed to the GOP’s success. These ideas include keeping our nation secure, keeping taxes low and having a federal government that is smaller, smarter and more accountable to the people.

SOURCE: https://riponsociety.org/2026/06/chairman-hill-charts-path-to-year-end-legislative-goals/

In the cover essay for the April 2016 Ripon Forum, the late Bob Woodson, civil rights leader and founder of the Woodson Center, shares his thoughts on how Congress can help the less fortunate and why a new approach to fighting poverty is needed in America:

"The facts are incontestable: After the expenditure of over $20 trillion in a 50-year “war on poverty,” the number of impoverished Americans has barely budged. The obvious failure of the strategy that has dominated our nation’s antipoverty agenda is testament to a critical need to reassess the fundamental assumptions that have guided policies and the qualifications of those who are considered “experts.”

"Reform is vital – not only to stop the waste of what is now an annual expenditure of almost $1 trillion on an ineffective strategy, but, more importantly, for the sake of millions of Americans and generations of families who are spending years in demeaning dependency ... the failure to develop an effective agenda is rooted in a misdiagnosis of the problem of poverty. Even among those who have the best intentions, policymakers on the Left and Right are deadlocked in debates about solutions, but are talking about entirely different cohorts of the poor.

"All people are not poor for the same reason, and our remedies must be as diverse as the cohorts of the population in poverty."

READ MORE: https://riponsociety.org/article/fighting-poverty-welfare-vs-a-way-out/

ICYMI: 99% of U.S. military power comes from the commercial grid. Grid failure isn't just an energy problem — it's a national security crisis. Center for Grid Security at SAFE Executive Director Danielle Russo on what Congress must do in the latest Ripon Forum:

The first crisis is one of military vulnerability. The Department of War relies on the commercial grid for approximately 99 percent of its power requirements. The remaining one percent of on-base generation cannot sustain critical operations during prolonged outages. To expand on the experience of Uri, several of Texas’s 15 military installations lost power. Critical military operations were relocated to secondary facilities, consuming resources and reducing operational capacity — an empirical demonstration that the most powerful military on earth is operationally vulnerable when the grid fails. The storm also revealed the consequences of inadequate transmission capacity. Studies post-Uri conclude that expanded interregional transmission could have acted as a lifeline, allowing gigawatts of additional supply to flow into Texas, keeping the heat and power on for hundreds of thousands to millions of customers and avoiding part of the loss of life, property, and military readiness.

The second crisis relates to economic and technological dominance. The country that can build and power artificial intelligence infrastructure at scale will define the next era. As of late 2025, 241 gigawatts of U.S. data center projects remain in development pipelines, but only one-third are under active development. Grid constraints are strangling infrastructure before it is built. Wood Mackenzie analysts warn that most of these projects “will never get built” under current grid limitations. While AI has dominated the focus in Washington, SAFE calls for prioritizing not just data center loads, but all defense-critical and energy intensive industries — including semiconductor fabrication, aluminum and steel production, automotive manufacturing — in addition to supporting the buildout of AI data centers. We need more power, and soon, to keep up in great power competition. Speed to power is no longer an economic preference. It is a national security requirement.

The third crisis involves escalating cyber threats compounded by uncoordinated defenses. The Department of Energy reports that malicious attacks on the grid continue to grow in frequency and sophistication. Recent studies indicate that coordinated cyber-physical attacks on grid connected inverters and associated controls could induce local voltage and frequency instability and, under certain conditions, contribute to cascading disruptions across parts of the bulk power system. Yet federal cybersecurity enforcement lacks the resources to address these threats.

READ MORE: https://riponsociety.org/article/no-power-no-defense-the-national-security-case-for-strengthening-the-grid/

TEDDY TWEET OF THE WEEK

“The vital thing for the nation no less than the individual to remember is that, while dreaming and talking both have their uses, these uses must chiefly exist in seeing the dream realized and the talk turned into action.”

Theodore Roosevelt
Stafford Little Lecture at Princeton University
November 1917

ICYMI: Data centers are reshaping communities — and CEO of the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy Dr. George McCarthy says in the latest Ripon Forum that local leaders need to get ahead of the energy, water, and land costs before the next approval is signed:

The data center buildout is one of the most significant waves of infrastructure investment in American history. It creates real economic value and accelerates technological capabilities that benefit everyone. The question is not whether it should happen, but whether the communities making it possible — contributing their land, energy, water, and civic infrastructure — share equitably in its benefits.

Energy, water, and land: each represents something a community gives when it hosts a data center. Each deserves to be accounted for honestly, managed responsibly, and compensated fairly. The tools exist. The will to use them is growing. Communities that engage with clear eyes and strong preparation will be the ones who can say, years from now, that the digital revolution worked for them — not through them.

READ MORE: https://riponsociety.org/article/the-triple-challenge-facing-data-centers-and-the-communities-where-they-are-built/

ICYMI: China controls 70% of clean energy manufacturing. Russia is locking in nuclear partnerships for generations. America's answer isn't to out-subsidize them — it's to out-innovate them. ClearPath Foundation CEO Jeremy Harrell makes the conservative case for energy dominance in the latest Ripon Forum:

The answer for the U.S. is not to copy or out-subsidize China and Russia. Instead, we should play to our uniquely American strengths and do it with much greater focus. The U.S. still has the best innovation ecosystem in the world. We have deep capital markets, world-class research institutions, top engineering talent and a private sector that can move faster and adapt better than any centrally planned economy. We also have something China does not: a network of allies and partners that want American energy.

First, the U.S. should double down on technologies where we can innovate quickly to define the future instead of chasing where China already has scale. Advanced nuclear is a key technology area where U.S. companies are rapidly innovating small modular reactors (SMRs), microreactors, fusion machines and more. By some estimates, the market for new nuclear generation could reach about $380 billion annually by 2050, presenting a huge strategic and commercial opportunity for American innovators. Enhanced geothermal systems present another technology area where the U.S. currently holds genuine technological superiority over China and Russia with advanced drilling techniques adapted from the oil and gas industry. The International Energy Agency forecasts that geothermal could meet up to 15 percent of global electricity demand growth through 2050. These are not niche technologies. They are high-potential platforms for American leadership.

Second, energy innovation only matters if the technology can be built at speed and scale. That means modernizing permitting, strengthening domestic manufacturing and putting steel in the ground for the infrastructure needed to support rising electricity demand. In this environment, slow approvals for transmission lines, reactors, mines and pipelines are not just frustrating. They are a competitive disadvantage. If it takes America too long to build, our competitors will pass us by and the world will buy from someone else.

Third, for American innovators to win in global energy markets, tools like the U.S. Export-Import Bank (EXIM), the International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) and the Trade and Development Agency (USTDA) can help level the playing field if they are used with a clear strategic purpose. American innovation should not stop at our borders. It should power a stronger global demand for clean, affordable and reliable U.S. energy. But our economic policy tools must be fit for purpose. Reauthorizing and modernizing EXIM this year would be an important step forward. With the right enhancements, EXIM can help scale advanced nuclear, geothermal, LNG infrastructure and other strategic clean energy systems in markets that are growing rapidly. Just as important is better coordination across EXIM, DFC and USTDA, along with closer partnerships with allies. Concepts like Energy Security Compacts offer a practical path by aligning diplomacy, project development, financing and exports into a unified approach.

This strategy is focused on ensuring that America shapes the next generation of global energy systems. The countries that finance and deploy these technologies will do more than win market share. They will build alliances, set standards and strengthen their position in the world all while reducing global emissions.

As Republicans, we should be confident in making that case. Supporting strategic clean energy systems is a practical extension of conservative principles. It means backing innovation, strengthening domestic industry, expanding exports and reducing dependence on adversarial supply chains. It means understanding that energy dominance and global energy leadership go hand in hand.

That’s why the right strategy for American energy dominance is simple: innovate fast, build here and sell globally.

READ MORE: https://riponsociety.org/article/an-american-strategy-for-global-clean-energy-leadership/

From September 2020 remarks to The Ripon Society, Cathy McMorris Rodgers made the case for American leadership on the world stage — and what it would take to stay ahead of China:

“I come from Washington state – the most trade dependent state in the country. Forty percent of our jobs are trade dependent and we export a lot to China and to the entire Pacific rim. I think, where my heart is right now, it is important for America to be smart, be strategic, and lead the American way. The relationship that we’ve had with China has been an important one, and is going to continue to be an important one, but we need to make sure that we’re continuing to bring China our way, where China respects individual rights and intellectual property rights.”

READ MORE: https://riponsociety.org/2020/09/we-need-to-make-sure-we-are-building-a-strong-foundation-here-at-home-and-holding-china-accountable/

ICYMI: In the latest Ripon Forum, Congresswoman Julie Fedorchak (R-ND) argues that biofuels are a key part of America's energy dominance — and that North Dakota is helping fuel the world:

One of my most important legislative efforts for North Dakota is already across the finish line. My legislation to stop the Biden administration’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Resource Management Plan (RMP) for our state passed both the House and Senate and was signed into law. That plan would have been devastating—costing an estimated 12,000 jobs and $34 million in annual state revenue. Completing that was critical for our workers, our communities, and our economy.

Looking ahead, I’m focused on two key priorities. First, the High-Capacity Grid Act. We need more power to meet growing demand, especially with the rise of AI and data centers. The reality is, we can’t build new infrastructure fast enough, so we must make better use of existing infrastructure. This legislation will help modernize America’s transmission system by requiring the use of best-available transmission conductors for new interstate transmission lines and rebuilds.

Second, year-round E15 and the Farm Bill. Biofuels are an important part of America’s energy dominance and another way North Dakota is helping fuel the world. I serve as Co-Chair of the Congressional Biofuels Caucus to advance policies that will help expand domestic energy production, empower rural America, and deliver practical solutions for North Dakotans. I am also on Speaker Johnson’s Rural Domestic Energy Council. This group of House Members has drafted language to provide for year-round E15 that aims to address concerns of all stakeholders. The goal is to have this bill pass both chambers of Congress so it can be signed into law by President Trump. Additionally, the Working Families Tax Cuts Act included more than two-thirds of the Farm Bill, with the rest of the Farm Bill heading to the House Floor soon. I look forward to voting in support of the package, which makes conservation programs more farmer-friendly, enhances credit provisions, and makes improvements to programs in rural America.

These are practical, results-driven efforts that will make a real difference for North Dakota families and our future.

READ MORE: https://riponsociety.org/article/ripon-profile-of-julie-fedorchak/

TEDDY TWEET OF THE WEEK

“We call to mind the deaths of those who died that the nation might live, who wagered all that life holds dear for the great prize of death in battle.”

Theodore Roosevelt
Remarks on Memorial Day
Arlington, Virginia
May 30, 1902

HONOR THE FALLEN – MEMORIAL DAY 2026