Why Is the Biden Administration Attacking America’s ‘Energy Independence?’

This past week, Real Clear Energy featured a piece by Dan Newhouse & Carol Miller regarding President Biden’s lack of support for homegrown energy infrastructure. As the introduction of the piece asserts, “many presidents who came before [Biden] shared the collective goal of achieving and maintaining American security and independence, President Biden and his Administration are acting in direct contradiction of those interests.”

Earlier this year, the U.S. Department of Energy reported that 6.1 million barrels of crude oil were imported into the US from Russia. This staggering amount is the highest reported level in the past 10 years. Subsequently, Russia has become the third largest oil exporter in the world during the Biden Administration.

As Newhouse & Miller point out, the US dominated the global energy production game before Biden came into office. In 2017, the US became a net exporter of natural gas. With this power, our nation was able to secure reliable, affordable energy that brought in revenue, stability, and peace of mind that our reliance on foreign nations for energy resources was diminishing. But just recently, our imports started to exceed our exports, putting us in a primarily dependent position.

As written in the RealClear piece, “Rather than harnessing the power and innovation of American energy, the Biden Administration has created a power vacuum by taking American oil and gas off the market.” Giving the predominant Russian pipeline, Nord Stream 2, the green light to continue operation while cancelling the American powerhouse pipeline Keystone XL says a lot about President Biden’s priorities. Obviously, energy independence isn’t one of them.

To regain our prolific energy independence, our government officials must be supporting homegrown energy infrastructure like the Dakota Access and Revolution Pipelines while also pushing for commonsense, fact-based energy policy. The article ends with the following key passage:

“America has an opportunity to continue to be a global energy player, but if we prioritize foreign energy production, we risk destabilizing the market for ourselves and partners abroad. As we look toward 245 more years of American independence, we must ask ourselves – how can we seize that opportunity?”