Is Biden right?
In an interview with ABC’s This Week on Sunday, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said the U.S. would need to decrease its reliance on foreign oil by embracing renewable energy, instead of a far more economical solution: increasing domestic production.
Speaking to host George Stephanopoulos, Psaki remarked, “We need to reduce our dependence on foreign oil, on oil in general, and we need to look at other ways of having energy in our country and others.”
She elaborated her statements, pointing to several European countries realizing they “need to reduce their own reliance on Russian oil.”
Psaki’s remarks have been made as concerns swirl that the cost of energy will only continue to climb amid the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine. The war between the two nations has also caused NATO countries like Germany to recognize their dependence on energy from Russia.
This dependence on Russian oil has had ramifications, limiting the kind of sanctions and their severity Europe and the U.S. can place on Putin, with sanctions specifically being designed to avoid Russian fuel exports, as a move like that could cause fuel prices to soar with little warning.
Psaki’s comments also follow a decision by the Biden administration last week to delay gas and oil leases after a federal judge prevented the administration from using higher cost estimates for climate change to regulate polluting industries.
The ruling came as a result of President Joe Biden’s decision on his first day in office to reinstate the climate cost estimate to $51 per ton of carbon dioxide emissions, a $44 increase from the $7 Trump slashed it during his administration.
But the Russia-Ukraine conflict has also reignited a conversation about domestic oil production and Biden’s resistance to it, with many being of the view that Biden should reverse resistance. Representative August Pfluger (R-TX) shared this view, saying embracing local oil production would ensure the U.S. “regain our dominance on the world stage.”
