As gas prices soar nationwide, a Tuesday news release from the White House did not go over as planned.
The release relayed comments Biden made to a reporter following his arrival at a naval air station in Westworth Village, Texas.
“Mr. President, do you have a message for the American people on gas prices?” the reporter asked.
“They’re going to go up,” Biden said. “Can’t do much right now. Russia is responsible.”
This was an actual, official White House press release. pic.twitter.com/8sMCiQQBhC
— Jada Yuan (@jadabird) March 9, 2022
As a general rule, it’s not a great look for the president to tell Americans there’s nothing he can do to fix a crisis plaguing the country. If the White House thought this release was going to put people at ease, it was sorely mistaken.
Furthermore, the claim from Biden that he cannot do anything about the current gas crisis is simply untrue.
Biden’s comments in the news release mirror ones he made in a separate speech on Tuesday. He said attempts to blame him for rising gas prices are dishnonest.
“It’s simply not true that my administration or policies are holding back domestic energy production,” Biden said. “That’s simply not true.”
Biden: “It’s simply not true that my administration or policies are holding back domestic energy production.” pic.twitter.com/mw22wmVHU0
— The Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) March 8, 2022
“In the United States, 90 percent of onshore oil production takes place on land that isn’t owned by the federal government,” he continued. “Of the remaining 10 percent that occurs on federal land, the oil and gas industry has millions of acres leased.
“They have 9,000 permits to drill now. They could be drilling right now, yesterday, last week, last year. They have 9,000 to drill onshore that are already approved. So let me be clear. Let me be clear — they are not using them for production now. That’s their decision. These are the facts.”
According to Fox Business, American Petroleum Institute president and CEO Mike Sommers said the Biden administration’s attempt to blame oil companies for allegedly refusing to drill is misguided.
“This represents a fundamental misunderstanding as to how this process works,” Sommers said. “Once you lease land there is a whole process that you have to go through.
“First you have to actually discover whether there is oil and gas in that land. Second of all, you have to get a permit to actually develop that land. … Right now we actually are developing more leases than we have in two decades, so the White House certainly doesn’t have their facts straight on this.”
Meanwhile, Biden issued an executive order pausing leasing for oil companies on federal lands.
He claims he “can’t do much right now” to decrease gas prices, but American Exploration & Production Council CEO Anne Bradbury told Fox that lifting this restriction would greatly benefit the country’s oil and gas situation. Instead, Biden presented misleading information and blamed oil companies for his shortcomings.
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“That accusation is a complete red herring,” Bradbury said. “It’s really a distraction from the fact that this administration has paused leasing on federal lands, something that we’re concerned about and something that we think needs to continue right away.”
Not to mention that Biden killed the Keystone XL Pipeline on his first day in office. The pipeline would have carried oil from Alberta, Canada, to Nebraska.
The White House can issue statements and news releases blaming Russia or American oil companies all it wants, but it will not change the fact that Biden’s own actions have worsened the gas crisis.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.