Being Taken Advantage Of?

I have been up for a promotion for the past year to Consultant. My manager has told me since I started I was on track for this promotion for over a year now, and that I would have already been promoted had it not been for COVID. I am currently doing the work of a Consultant (I am not exaggerating, my 1+ year long project that started in November that I interviewed for has the same bill rate as someone on my team who has been in Consulting 7+ years and my title on the Project is Managing Consultant, same as his). Nothing about my role reflects Analyst level work. Spoiler alert, didnt get the promotion. I asked for specific shortcomings from my manager, who said he advocated for me to be promoted. He said the decision came from above but when I pressed him he gave vague answers. I have extremely strong public feedback (we have a database for this) from every single project leader I have worked with. Multiple leaders of my office have acknowledged that I have made invaluable contributions with respect to both internal work and to our clients. None of this seems to matter. I spoke to a Managing Director who also gave a vague answer, stating it may have to do with my low utilization in 2020. My % of billable work was pretty low in 2020 (project ended in March of 2020, and I was aligned to another project for 2 months that never ended up starting). I have never turned down a project, and have built out a broad range of skills to make me a target for any role. Please WSO, I would really appreciate any advice from anyone.