Posted on July 2, 2025
Why Should Delaware Care?
Delaware’s legislative session ended with a drama that highlighted how Republicans can wield power in Dover even with relatively small numbers. It also highlighted the stark political divide in Delaware over renewable energy that exists even as electricity rates have skyrocketed in the mid-Atlantic region since COVID.
Delaware’s 2025 legislative session ended in the early morning hours of Tuesday after Republicans pulled back on threats to block passage of the state’s capital budget.
They did so as part of a compromise deal struck with Democrats that also had lawmakers retooling an offshore wind bill that the governor had signed into law just hours earlier.
In all, those final hours capped a contentious 6-month legislative session marked by fights over the Port of Wilmington, over changes to rules that govern the biggest companies in the world, and over the state’s ability to veto local governments’ land-use decisions.
The final legislative day also featured lawmakers’ rush to pass dozens of other consequential bills, including ones to create an inspector general, to ban police from partnering with ICE, and to dole out nearly $100 million to nonprofit companies.
Still, the showdown around the passage of the capital budget and its related maneuvers with the offshore wind bill overshadowed other efforts on Monday and into early Tuesday morning.
That drama centered around a bill that would override Sussex County’s denial late last year of a land-use permit filed by US Wind – a company that wants to build a wind farm with more than 100 turbines off the Delmarva coastline.
The company had appealed the county’s denial to a Delaware court. That case is currently pending.
On Thursday, Senate Republicans called on their Democratic colleagues to pull back on what they claimed was legislative overreach that would clear the way for the controversial offshore wind project.
They said that the future of the county permit for the wind energy company should be decided in the courts.
But Republicans did not have enough members in the legislature to directly vote down any bill. Instead, they used their sole piece of leverage to force the wind energy issue, and blocked the state’s bond bill — which requires a supermajority vote to be passed.
That move set up Democrats and Republicans to face off in negotiations on Monday over the two pieces of legislation.
Hanging in the balance were scores of road and other capital spending projects, as well as the wind energy project that has has rapidly become one of the hardest fought political battles in Delaware and Maryland’s Eastern Shore.
“This is a foundational project for our state’s energy future,” Sen. Stephanie Hansen (D-Middletown) said during a Senate hearing Monday evening.
Sen. Stephanie Hansen pushed the legislature to adopt a bill that would clear the way for construction of a wind energy site off the Delmarva coast.
In response , Sen. Brian Pettyjohn (R-Georgetown) said during the same hearing that the bill at its core “has always been about local control.” He then asked Hansen, who is the bill sponsor, if she had reached out to Sussex County government.
She said she did, but was met with silence.
Shortly after the comments, the Senate approved in a party-line vote an amended version of the bill to strip Sussex County of its permit-revoking ability over the wind project.
Democrats had hoped the amendment to the bill – which added a sunset date of 2026 – would be enough to convince at least one Senate Republican to end the impasse over the capital budget, commonly called the bond bill.
Earlier that day, Sen. Eric Buckson (R-Dover) told Spotlight Delaware that Democrats had lobbied for him to switch sides on the issue, but said he and his caucus would not budge.
Following the Senate hearing, Pettyjohn also said Republicans would make good on the promise to continue blocking the billion-dollar bond bill.
“As it is right now, there’s no bond bill,” Pettyjohn said.
What followed was hours of negotiations between legislators. As they continued on, several renewable energy advocates lingered within Legislative Hall after previously holding a small demonstration with signs calling on lawmakers to support the offshore wind project.
Wind energy advocates held a small demonstration within Legislative Hall on Monday.
Also during the negotiations, Gov. Matt Meyer signed into law the amended wind energy bill that the Senate had just passed. During the signing, he said it was important to get the offshore wind energy project “done quickly and safely to provide sustainable power to Delaware.”
Hours later, as the evening crept closer to midnight and lawmakers’ patience steadily grew thinner, the Senate reconvened.
During the hearing, the leadership handed out a new bill that rescinded the recently signed law with identical language except for one change that inserted a new implementation date of January 2026.
Leaders from both parties said they had agreed to the change during their closed-door negotiations.
The new bill subsequently passed the Senate, and later the House of Representatives. Both chambers also later passed the billion-dollar bond bill, with each celebrating the passage with applause.
Members of the Delaware House of Representatives applaud their actions on Monday.
Included within the bond bill’s appropriations was $50 million to shift state computer systems to the cloud, $10 million for the Delaware Sports Tourism Fund, and $20 million for the design and construction of Biden Hall at the University of Delaware.
“This year’s Capital Budget allocates nearly one billion dollars toward road and infrastructure improvements, school construction, state facilities improvements, state park improvements and other economic development initiatives,” Sen. Jack Walsh (D-Wilmington) said in a statement following passage of the bond bill.
Yet, while billed as a compromise, the deal that allowed the bond bill to pass appeared to give Democrats a bigger win because it allowed for the renewable energy legislation to continue to clear the way for the offshore wind energy project.
Following the Senate vote, Pettyjohn told Spotlight Delaware that the compromise was a beneficial one because the new changes would allow courts the time to weigh into the controversy.
When pressed about what he would say if courts rule in favor of Sussex County only to have the new wind energy law quash a legal victory upon its implementation next year, Pettyjohn said his Republican leadership team had consulted with county officials who expressed that they were “OK with this bill.”
“This wasn’t done in a vacuum with the county,” he said.
