Trump Called This One …

By: Chris Johnson

Although it feels like the distant past, the final debate for the 2020 presidential election yielded Donald Trump one soundbite in particular for which he had been angling for weeks. Leading up to the debate, knowing that it would hurt Joe Biden in important industrial states like Pennsylvania and Michigan, Republicans had been trying to pin down Biden’s policy on fossil fuels. He’d given conflicting comments between wanting to take a hard line on American oil production in favor of “green energy” and paying lip service to the importance of the oil industry.

In that last debate, Biden finally revealed his intention to “transition” away from oil and to incentivize solar and wind power. Trump rode that message from state to state in his final, feverous tour of rallies which ended in Pennsylvania on election night where he played that clip from the debate as a closing statement before America’s decision.

In another rally, Trump made this shocking comment, “You’re paying what, $2 a gallon for your gasoline? …If Biden got in you’d be paying $7, $8, $9, then they’d say get rid of your car…”

An October 2020 Fox Business article quoted Continental Resources founder Harold Hamm, “Six-dollar gas is coming if Trump isn’t re-elected… If Biden is elected and his plan on energy is adopted, he will send America into a deep depression and millions of jobs will be lost in Texas, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Oklahoma, North Dakota and we will once again be beholden to foreign rogue regimes for our energy.”

Of course, these predictions were made well before Putin had tipped his hand toward attacking Ukraine, but the price of fuel had been steadily ascending since the early days of Biden’s administration as among his first actions were halting the Keystone Pipeline and suspending oil leases in Alaska. Keen memories again may recall that going into the Independence day weekend last year, the national average hit $3.11, the highest it had been in 7 years. It only went up from there. As I write, it is $4.17. Meanwhile, in L.A. some stations actually are charging upwards of $8 per gallon.

And it is almost definitely going to continue in that direction, as on March 8, President Biden announced a ban of oil imports from Russia, which supplies the US with about 200,000 gallons of oil per day. And as Mr. Hamm predicted, Biden’s administration is indeed seeking to alleviate this loss with trade deals with rogue regimes like Iran and Venezuela.

Donald Trump’s prediction has similarly been eerily accurate, not only with the price of gasoline, but with the administration’s method of dealing with it: counseling Americans to get rid of your gas vehicles and buy an electric vehicle.

On March 7, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said, “Clean transportation can bring significant cost savings for the American people as well. Last month, we announced a $5 billion investment to build out a nationwide electric vehicle charging network so that people from rural to suburban to urban communities can all benefit from the gas savings of driving an EV…”

And President Biden himself explained his hope for rising fuel costs the following day: “Transforming our economy to run on electric vehicles powered by clean energy…will help… It will make America a leader to exporting clean energy to countries all around the world. This is the goal we should be racing towards.”

In spite of the picture Biden painted during the 2020 presidential election – the picture which he used to alleviate the concerns brought to American people by President Trump – that the “transition” would happen gradually rather than drastically, EPA Administrator Michael Regan revealed, “We’re pressing the accelerator to reach a zero-emissions future sooner than most people thought.”

The president is trying to frame this as a method of dealing with Russian aggression, but the fact is, this has been the strategy for transition all along: choke Americans at the gas pump until they’re forced to buy the products he wants them to.

His argument is that we ought not to be reliant on Russia’s oil, but should turn instead to “clean” battery powered vehicles. However, most EV batteries use lithium and cobalt, both of which are mined overwhelmingly by the Chinese. So, in this transition, our energy dependence simply switches from one totalitarian regime to another, which also happens to be our nation’s biggest global competitor. Incidentally, according to Peter Schweizer’s research, the Chinese government also has significant financial dealings with the Biden family.

And the technique used by the Chinese (who care nothing for “clean energy”) in mining these materials largely offsets any environmental benefit driving an electric vehicle might have.

Even with the Biden administrations feigned blindness towards the massive amounts of oil waiting to be mined beneath our own nation, we are not limited to buying our energy from despots.

After Biden’s announcement banning Russian oil, Alberta, Canada’s Premier, Jason Kenney, invited President Biden to “discuss how to ship nearly 1 million barrels a day of responsibly produced energy every day from the USA’s closest friend and ally. All it would take is his approval for Keystone XL. Easy.”

Approving the Keystone XL pipeline would replace the oil we’re no longer buying from Russia and doubtless drive prices down, but lower fuel prices – while enabling Americans to prosper – also removes the incentive to invest in electric vehicles powered by batteries made with rare earth minerals purchased from China.

Whether or not the Biden administration chooses to take the steps to stabilize fuel prices at a rate Americans can afford will reveal the president’s priorities: global energy partnerships or American prosperity.

Sadly, as Trump predicted and as Biden’s own spokespeople have made clear in the last few days, we can see where his priorities lie.

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