The GOP's four biggest lies about Joe Biden and fossil fuels

[Nevilledog]

Link to tweet

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2022/03/republican-biggest-lies-about-joe-biden-energy-oil-gas-prices-fossil-fuels/

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Let’s break down some of the biggest whoppers:

1. The administration “destroyed” our energy industry

In a post to Twitter this week, House Minority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) wrote that rising prices at the pump during Biden’s presidency “is what happens when you destroy America’s energy industry”—part of a broader argument that Biden is waging “war” on domestic fossil fuel companies.

For a destroyed industry, Big Oil is doing exceptionally well. Two years after the pandemic tanked oil demand and prices, the nation’s largest producers—ExxonMobil, Chevron, and ConocoPhillips—have seen their profits skyrocket alongside energy prices. And while Biden campaigned on a promise to “take on the fossil fuel industry” and end drilling on federal lands and waters, that has not materialized.

In fact, to the frustration of climate and environmental advocates, the Biden administration approved more drilling permits during his first year in office than former President Donald Trump did in any of his first three, according to data compiled by the conservation group Center for Western Priorities. It also held the largest offshore oil and gas lease sale in US history in the Gulf of Mexico last year. A federal judge later vacated those leases, concluding that the Biden administration failed to properly account for climate effects when it held the offshore auction.

“The Biden admin is doing next to nothing to practically inhibit near-term oil production,” Casey Merriman, an analyst at the industry research firm Energy Intelligence, wrote on Twitter.

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