02.08.22

It’s about preserving and creating jobs in Louisiana, not sending them elsewhere

WASHINGTON- US Senator Bill Cassidy, MD (R-LA), today had harsh words with Laura Daniel Davis, the Biden administration’s nominee for assistant secretary for land and mineral management at the US Department of the Interior (DOI) about the retrograde energy of the administration. policies that undermine not only American energy independence, but also efforts to reduce global emissions. During a Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee hearing, the nominee also declined to comment on whether the DOI considers the findings of a report by the Obama administration’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) from 2016 that blocking energy lease sales in the United States may actually increase global greenhouse gas emissions from emissions created during the production and transmission of foreign energy to the United States

Excerpts from the discussion are transcribed below or you can watch the entire interaction here.

Cassidy: We now have the highest inflation in 40 years. If we included the cost of energy, the inflation rate would not be 7%, it would be approaching 10%. Russia has weight in the EU. We have higher energy prices here because this administration kind of led an effort to limit North American resource production and development. Which we can see unequivocally. Indeed, we have Democratic senators who want to leave the EU dry and vulnerable to the Russians…We’ve gone from a year of energy independence to crawling to OPEC asking them to increase global supply because our gasoline prices have gone up so much. This is the legacy of this administration so far.

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Cassidy: The 2016 Obama administration study conducted by BOEM concluded that Americas greenhouse gas emissions will be little affected by leasing decisions on BOEM’s offshore leasing program, indeed could result in –if we don’t lease — an increase because the emissions associated with importing foreign oil are greater than domestic production. By the way, I represent the workers who will be on these platforms, so it’s also about jobs here versus jobs elsewhere in the world.…Do they take into account that it actually reduces greenhouse gas emissions to produce it domestically and creates American jobs and strengthens our economy as opposed to the Russian economy or another economy in which they pollute any further ? Is that part of the deliberations?

Daniel Davis: So I want to make it clear that—that production continued onshore and overseas—

Cassidy: We are of course talking about new leases. We are talking about new leases.

Daniel Davis: Ok, I’m sorry, I must have misunderstood. I am aware of the 2016 report and analysis that you refer to, uh, and I appreciate what you say about it uh in regards to the analysis that was developed in 2016.

Cassidy: Ms. Daniel-Davis, I suspect some of these decisions are made higher than you, but the only leverage I have right now is to oppose your nomination and until those answers are given and it’s march 2^n/a until we know it, I will speak on behalf of my workers, my economy and the global environment to deliver a message that we do not like the direction this administration is taking.

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