Steve Cortes, president and founder of the League of American Workers, said that wind energy projects harm wildlife and waste resources for political gain. This statement was made during the Blown Away documentary.
"These windmills, they're giant," said Cortes. "They're disgustingly ugly. They are bad for the environment, especially animals. They are one gigantic expensive scam."
The expansion of wind energy projects in the United States has become politically contentious, particularly under the Trump administration's renewed term in 2025. According to Reuters, the administration initially froze federal approvals for wind projects, leading to lawsuits from 17 states and Washington D.C., which argued that this move threatened jobs and emissions goals. Offshore efforts like the Empire Wind project near New York were briefly halted but later permitted after negotiations. This situation highlights growing tension between federal oversight and state-led renewable ambitions.
As of late 2024, the U.S. had over 153 gigawatts of installed wind power capacity, making onshore wind the nation’s fourth-largest energy source. According to Windfair, Texas leads with 40,500 megawatts and over 16,000 turbines, accounting for 28% of U.S. wind generation. The sector added 6.5 gigawatts in 2024 alone, demonstrating resilience despite federal regulatory pauses and rising material costs.
Wind energy’s environmental footprint is among the lowest of all power sources. As reported by the National Institutes of Health, life cycle emissions from wind are 36% to 85% lower than coal and 32% to 72% lower than natural gas, even when accounting for carbon capture. These findings support wind’s central role in climate mitigation strategies compared to other energy options.
Cortes is a former financial trader and conservative commentator who served as a senior adviser to Donald Trump’s 2016 and 2020 campaigns. According to Keynote Speakers, he also led Hispanic outreach for Trump and has appeared on Fox News, CNN, and CNBC. He now heads the League of American Workers, focusing on U.S. labor issues and nationalistic economic policies.
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FULL, UNEDITED TRANSCRIPT
Steve Cortes: [00:00:00] These windmills, they're giant. They're disgustingly ugly. They are bad for the environment, especially animals, and they are one gigantic expensive scam. Once you know the full truth of the wind scam, you will be blown away. We are here on the ground in New Mexico because it's the home of the biggest wind project in the country being built right now.
And it also happens to have right below my feet in almost endless supply of fossil fuels, natural gas, and other fuels to power our country. Now, many of you. Might have learned a bit about this scan, this so-called green boondoggle business from Hollywood of all places in the hit show Landman Billy Bob Thornton's character.
He went on an epic [00:01:00] rant that went mega viral. He described the massive scale of these monstrosities that now pollute our landscapes and our ocean Vistas 400 feet tall. The concrete foundation covers a third of an acre and goes down in the ground 12 feet. He also peeled back the curtain on the fallacy of the very term.
Clean energy. They use clean energy to power the oil wells. They use alternative energy. There's nothing clean about this. In reality, these giant turbines, these colossus of radicalism, they're anything but clean. Not to mention the crony capitalists and the echo extremists who tried to convince you that this energy source is just as pure as the wind in your hair.
It's a lie. It's a massive grand consequential lie. In reality, these towers, they cannot begin to function without. You guessed it, [00:02:00] petroleum. Now, that fictional oil man, Tommy Norris, he gets a lot correct in his rant. And I will give you the receipts to prove it, but he also gets one big conclusion, totally wrong.
We have 120 year petroleum based infrastructure. Our whole lives depend on it. And you know what the kicker is? We're gonna run out of it before we find its replacement. We actually are not going to run out of energy because the good Lord above has blessed this land, our land with such bountiful supplies of fossil fuels, that we will not only survive until alternative energy sources are viable, we will thrive.
And Prosper fully harnessing the awesome power of energy just waiting for US underground and especially natural gas, which we can deploy in a super efficient and incredibly environmentally responsible manner for many, many decades to come. Paul guessing is the [00:03:00] president of the Rio Grande Foundation. So Paul, tell us about your organization about the Rio Grande Foundation.
Yeah. Rio Grande Foundation's a public policy think tank. We research issues here in New Mexico and we focus on the broader state economy, trying to get this state, which has so much to offer to be a pro-growth center in the American Southwest. It seems to be that a lot of the decision makers here, uh, in Santa Fe almost look down upon energy, despite it being so important for New Mexico.
They like the money that it spends off and that they get to spend, but they don't understand the importance of the industries. The majority of people elected to our legislature, our governor, are not understanding of the energy situation and how they can use that industry and benefit from that industry.
For all new Mexicans. We have almost endless supplies in this country of natural gas beneath our feet. Uh, is that. At least until alternatives, someday do become [00:04:00] viable. Uh, is that the primary energy source to power our economy? Absolutely. If I was advising this governor and trying to achieve some of the goals that she says she wants to, in terms of the environment, uh, I would've said, look, let's move to natural gas.
Oil and gas jobs are great jobs, aren't they? Yep. Absolutely. They, they pay good money. The Navajo Nation is very concerned about that because you have a lot of folks on the Navajo reservation who are able to make very good incomes and very impoverished areas, some of the most impoverished areas of our country, and that also funds their schools and funds a lot of the economic activity that does happen in that reservation.
And, and, uh, the policy makers in New Mexico are just. Looking at it and saying, we're getting rid of it anyway. Right. Let me ask you more about the wind. Not only is it not economically viable, but you have just a beautiful topography here in New Mexico. I mean, you really have been blessed. Some of the vistas are some of the most impressive in the world.
I view these giant turbines as really a a form of [00:05:00] pollution, of scenery, pollution. You can argue whether they're more or less attractive than solar. Certainly. Uh, solar is not attractive either, and they both have devastating environmental impacts of their own. Both of them impact birds, but just the amount of space they take up, you're really occupying a huge footprint and a footprint.
By the way, that requires a lot of fossil fuels, right? There's. A lot of traditional energy that goes into the manufacturer, the mining and all the materials and the shipping, everything that happens, it's just, it's crazy to say that it's somehow greener than the other traditional sources. Your style of life, your iPhone, your automobile, even your electric car.
It's gonna be nothing without real good, inexpensive, steady electricity and steady energy. If we continue to run down these roads to oblivion. If we continue to fall for these scans and if we continue to massively fund irresponsible fantasies, then we could end up. [00:06:00] In an energy nightmare scenario, a Mad max world where we cannot power our lives except for the plutocrats and the oligarchs like Al Gore, who grew generationally rich off of selling us this giant myth.
Now let's talk about why wind is inefficient. Unbelievably expensive and importantly, super ugly and disruptive. First, remember that wind is by definition, unreliable. Even in the windiest places on the planet, it does not always blow and it certainly cannot be counted on. When we most need the energy. In addition, the windiest places, they tend to be geographically very far away from the biggest energy consuming needs.
Now given this intermittency of wind and the latency of losing power. Every inch that it is transmitted along power lines. Wind simply cannot function as a [00:07:00] sole or even a primary power source. It must be backed up. And the default system, almost always, you guessed it, fossil fuels normally coal. Or natural gas, but that necessity for redundancy means that the economics of wind simply do not work.
The more we rely on wind power, the more expensive the electricity. Do you think I exaggerate? Have a look at this chart from the Wall Street Journal and it shows countries and their costs for electricity on the horizontal axis. Is the percentage of power derived from wind and solar put together? The vertical axis is the cost of power, electricity per kilowatt hour in the US highlighted there where we get about 10% of our electricity from these gross turbines.
Thankfully, power here is still very cheap because we have so much natural gas generation and a reasonable amount of nuclear. But note the countries to the top [00:08:00] and the right of the chart. Places like the uk, Netherlands, Denmark, these countries, these increasingly socialist countries that have gone all in for the echo extremist view, they plunge into so-called clean energy.
And what happens? Regular citizens there pay through the roof. For their electricity to power their homes. And power becomes so expensive that industry in these places, it de industrializes, even Germany, once the literal factory of Europe, it sees rapid deindustrialization that is driven in large part by its religious like devotion to a wind and sun agenda that simply.
Cannot affordably meet modern powered needs. Myron Lizer is the former vice president of the Navajo Nation of the United States. Myron, you had a pretty distinct honor. You got to speak to the Republican National Convention in 2020. [00:09:00] Tell us about it, please. That was a hoot back in 2020. Yes. Virtually, uh, on the homeland there and ship.
Brought New Mexico with the ship. Brought Pinnacle behind me, uh, wrote my own speech. They vetted it and said, yeah, let's do it. So, uh, what an honor. Okay, so Myron, you're pretty openly pro-Trump. Uh, but as you've explained, most tribal leaders historically have been very democratic. Uh, but Trump won. The American Indian vote this year, uh, nationwide.
And, and by a pretty healthy margin actually. How do you explain that, that gap between where the tribal leaders are and, uh, where the regular Navajos and, and other tribes are? When, uh, president Biden, when he said build back better, I had the scoff of that because how can you build back to a place you've never been talking about?
Indian country. We've never had, you know, factories on our lands. We've never had, you know, a lot of the, the benefits that, and the um, um, amenities that, uh, metropolitan areas had. So, uh. We need the jobs and we know we have to invite industry and we need the federal government's help to help us, uh, direct policy to those changes.
Uh, [00:10:00] but. Being partners, truly partners, where we're not exploited, we're not, uh, you know, getting the, the, the, the short end of the stick. And so when President Trump talks the way he talks, uh, as a businessman, I understand that. And I know that that consensus would easily be garnered in Indian country if we knew that, uh, we had a truly had a seat at the table.
There truly was an equity partner, uh, consideration for us. The, the other tribal leaders would come on board. How important are energy resources to the Navajos? Wow. You know, as a tribal leader, I believe it behooves us as tribal leaders to know all of our assets. Navajo in particular, um, Navajo right now, at this moment in time, we own four coal mines.
Uh, we have a hundred year supply of coal, and it's, it's probably some of the richest coal in North America. So to have that kind of asset in the ground and coal is viable, uh, perhaps the new technologies could be developed where it becomes cleaner. Right. And it's still a, um, a, a good utility scale power source that's, uh, reliable.
That's trustable. No more [00:11:00] brownouts, no more black starts, you know, the, the renewables are giving us and, you know, and the unsightly and taking up all the land, you know that, that renewables are doing well. And Myron it seems to me that if there's one group of people in America who will be environmentally careful and responsible about extracting fossil fuels, it's American Indians, right?
Who better than the American Indian than a native tribe to talk about environmental justice, right? Yeah, I mean of all people, V should be the first to be permitted. Exactly, exactly. I believe these giant turbines are incredibly ugly. They're really a form of pollution of some of the best scenery. In America or your thoughts, you're right.
As you look over the planes, you see these windmills just turning. It's like, what did it displace, right? I mean, who's ranch who gave up some cattle? Our area for the region, it's not what it's cracked up to be and how it was sold, right? Because what does it take? Uh, it takes fossil fuels to lubricate all those turbines up there and, you know, when they break down, they, they gotta replace them.
So it takes a [00:12:00] tremendous cost to maintain and upkeep. Them. Given that you represent our community again with a lot of economic challenges, does it bother you that this country is spending billions and billions of dollars? On these windmills, which are not economically viable, uh, which are not actually great for the environment, and maybe most importantly simply can't produce the amount of energy we need.
What most people don't really realize is those, all those projects are subsidized, right? And there's nothing free in this world. So it does cost somebody something, taxpayers, right? And so I don't even think we can quantify the cost because, uh, the, the. The people are touting these projects as, uh, the, the savior to America and, and the climate, when in actuality it's doing more harm to the climate because again, you know, how are you going to dispose of them once their service life is over?
It seems to me what you're asking for from President Trump, from Washington, from the American people, um, is a helping hand, not a handout. Ooh. Very powerful helping hand. You're right, we need the jobs and we don't wanna always have our hand out to the federal government. Help [00:13:00] us to be self-sustaining.
Help us to be self-reliant on the work of our own hands, the blood, the sweat, and the tears of our people, right? Working hard, helping America become the greatest country in the world. I. Myron, you're a great patriot. You really care about your people. It's incredibly impressive. Great to meet you. Yes, sir. I appreciate it, Steve.
Thank you so much for having me. Thank you. We are on the cusp of a true technology revolution. I'm talking about artificial intelligence. There are many incredible benefits that we will soon reap from ai. There are also some very real dangers to all of humanity. From ai, but I'm not here today to dive into those issues or debate the proper channeling for ai.
Instead, what is not debatable, the need for power, and it is galloping higher at an exponential rate. Data centers, ai, blockchain, all the avant guard, cutting edge technologies. They require mammoth amounts of [00:14:00] power. We used to view the big smoke stack plants as the biggest neediest consumers of power, but now it's firms like Google and Microsoft and Taiwan semiconductor look windmills and solar.
They're not even capable of making a material difference in supplying our current power needs. They're literally a drop in the proverbial ocean. When it comes to meeting future looking power needs, so we will never beat China in AI if we keep chasing this fantasy of so-called clean energy via the wind while they power up their ai.
By burning as much oil and coal as they please the biggest polluter on Earth China. But I'm not being pessimistic. The good news, the great news actually, is that we can, and we will meet here in America, these soaring. Power [00:15:00] needs and America can do it in a way that few other nations can, how through fossil fuels, especially natural gas, we have literal oceans of it Beneath our feet, we have been blessed with the miracle fuel that burns in an economically responsible way and provides nearly endless, dependable, reliable.
Affordable domestic energy. The enormous new chip plants that are being built to state over from where I am right now over in Arizona. What will power them? Not windmills, not some technology from pre-industrial Holland. No, it will be natural gas, glorious American gas. Even coal is far preferable to wind because it is so much more plentiful and reliable at a reasonable cost on that issue of cost.
Lemme show you another chart like the last one. This one comes from Bjorn Lamberg, an energy expert from the Hoover Institution of [00:16:00] Stanford University. That top line, the light blue one, it represents the cost of wind ascending as the percentage we rely on wind increases, which is the horizontal axis, meaning the more we rely on wind, the more backup we need from fossil fuel.
On this chart, it's coal and the black line at the bottom, the price per kilowatt hour for coal. Never changes. Why? Well, because the supply is nearly unlimited and it is predictable and it is set far to the future, but wind, wind is temperamental, unpredictable, and intermittent even in the best case scenarios.
So the redundancy issue means that despite the billions and billions we are spending on this scam, we still need the boondoggle of wind to be fully backed by old school energy sources wiping out any supposed cost safe. Okay, but aside from the Unworkable Economics of Wind [00:17:00] and other green New Deal scams, you might be saying, but what about the environment?
Don't we have to go this route regardless of the cost to save the planet? Actually. No, not at all. The climate hysteria is massively overblown and the earth is neither fragile nor in trouble first, even if you are concerned about CO2 levels, the emitters are not here in the United States, but rather across the world in China and India, and they show no signs of stopping.
In addition, rises in CO2, historically have come after rises in temperatures and not the other way around as climate alarmists would have you believe, but despite all the alarmism, remember that the climate always changes. Not very long ago. In the 1970s, corporate media platforms were screaming about the impending ice age.
Then it became all about global warming. [00:18:00] You might hear dire warnings like the earth is on fire. No, literally the earth is on fire. Massive wildfires are the result of climate change take cover. Well, actually, the amount of the earth burning has been declining steadily for well over a century. And it has nothing to do with climate.
But aren't the oceans burning? No, actually they're not. Water temperatures rise and fall over long cycles. Well before there was any industry on planet Earth, but the reality of science and physics is that surface air temperature has almost zero effect upon the temperature of the vast deep oceans.
Anyway. Now, as long as we're discussing the environment, what about the material harm? That these windmills do to wildlife, these props slaughter birds, hundreds of thousands of them every year in the United States, they are a menace to whales, and many experts [00:19:00] believe that the recent rash of giant dead whales washing up to America's eastern shoreline, it stems from these turbines being planted in the sea where their noise and disruption wreaks havoc.
Upon sea life sonar. Lastly, beauty matters, aesthetics matter. Some of the most gorgeous ocean vistas and country views in America have been utterly polluted by these gigantic eyes source. Why would we do this to America? The beautiful. The answer is that we should not and we cannot end this scam. Elisa Martinez was a 2020 US Senate candidate.
For New Mexico. So Elisa, you ran for office, which I really admire people who are willing to do that hard work and take the risks of putting yourself out there. Both the tribes and the state as a whole are blessed with tremendous natural resources, aren't they? Absolutely. We have become the second largest oil producing state in the country.[00:20:00]
We have tremendous natural gas reserves, uh, coal, as well as other. Natural resources that could be leveraged to lift the state out of poverty. But instead, we see these radical left policies from our governor, uh, Michelle Lujan. Grisham. It's not even a matter of, uh, you know, green energy. Sometimes it's just a matter of being contrarian and keeping the state and its people behind, given the reality that you are blessed with these resources as a state.
And yet it's one of the poorest states in America, by some measures, the poorest right state in America. Uh, that tells me that there are policy failures, right? That this isn't just bad luck or bad circumstances. If anything, you have good circumstances. Really bad ruling class decisions being made. Is that correct?
Well, in 2019, New Mexico passed the Energy Transition Act, which is similar to the Green New Deal. That's already the law of the land here. It's really a scam and it's a way for the left to come in, uh, again and transition everyone to dependency on the government. As somebody who clearly loves this land, loves New Mexico, [00:21:00] uh, somebody who cares about the environment.
Can we use fossil fuels in a way that is environmentally responsible? Well, absolutely. And we already are, right? We have, um, carbon capture techno technology, uh, that, you know, renders coal, very clean, very affordable, and let's be honest that not all households and not all community heat communities can even rely on renewables.
Do you know people who have been displaced by biden's? Massive over overregulation of the energy industry. Oh, absolutely. You know, New Mexico is home to many, uh, independent oil producers, especially in our Southeast Permian Basin. Many independent contractors that have gone outta business, that have left the state.
You know, and we're talking generations of, of family investment, uh, you know, in a small business. That just could not compete with these bigger, you know, oil and gas companies. So if anything, the left is empowering large corporations to dominate that, that industry. So, Elisa, thankfully new administration, right?
New sheriff in Washington, DC. What would be your message, [00:22:00] uh, to Donald Trump, to Energy Secretary Bergham? What would you ask them to do? I think it's time that we unleash our, you know, America's energy, independence and dominance and let's, you know, let's get to work. Let's roll up our sleeves and look at ways that we can, you know, move forward from, uh, you know, from the devastation and destruction caused by the Biden administration, that we shouldn't just be energy independent.
We should be full spectrum energy dominant. Oh, absolutely. And you know, again, this is a national security issue. When we're dependent on other countries like Venezuela for, uh, you know, for energy, when we have our own, it just doesn't make sense to me. And that's where we have to look beyond the talking points, right?
The left keeps saying, you know, climate control, green energy, uh, uh, renewable energy, but what is, what is really going on when you peel back the surface? We've seen it play out here in New Mexico firsthand. They don't have a plan. Seems to me that the plan is, uh, take as much of our money as possible, right?
Without producing real results. Take as much money as our, as possible. You know, pick and [00:23:00] choose who the winners are. 'cause somebody's getting the contract, put up all those windmills. It has to do with control. At the end of the day, this is an agenda. Control, control the population, you know, look no further than New Mexico.
We have the highest dependency, uh, on government, right? The highest poverty rates, lowest education outcomes. Uh, and you know, the list goes on. Let's stop investing in these scams, uh, you know, particularly these wind window scams. Uh, and let's start investing in, in people and, and energy sources that work.
And, uh, and we can do that. We will do it. Absolutely. Now, someday alternative sources will certainly power the earth, perhaps geothermal, which shows incredible promise at capturing the heat that Mother Earth naturally produces from the world's core that is nearly as hot as the sun. That alternative energy will be continual, dependable, with minimal disruption here above ground, but until that day arrives, we are blessed with fossil fuels.
That [00:24:00] keep our people employed and our environment protected, our homes heated and cooled, and our industries humming.
