President Biden’s Climate Policies Threaten America’s Energy Independence and National Security

May 20, 2021

The recent cyberattack that shut down the Colonial Pipeline essential to transporting gasoline on the East Coast made clear how vital pipelines are to making reliable and affordable energy accessible to every American citizen. The cyberattack disrupted oil and gas supplies up the east coast, with southern states feeling it the hardest. Higher gas prices and shortages temporarily occurred but the 5,500-mile pipeline has now restored its normal daily operations. 

The same cannot be said for the repercussions to come from President Biden’s decision on his first day in office to shut down the Keystone Pipeline. RealClear Energy discusses how the cancelation of the Keystone Pipeline will have far greater consequences for businesses and consumers in the years ahead than the cyberattack that shut down the Colonial Pipeline. 

 The RealClear Energy article went on to report more broadly on how Biden’s climate change initiatives will be destructive to America’s long-term economic well-being and national security: 

American energy independence is “inconsistent” with the Biden administration’s climate change agenda, according to a secretarial order from the Interior Department issued in April. The order explicitly points to the Trump administration’s pursuit of energy independence as one of several “obstacles” standing in the way of Biden’s efforts to “create jobs through a growing clean energy economy; and to bolster resilience to the impacts of climate change.” 

In this same order, Team Biden proceeds to dilute the Interior Department’s energy portfolio by restricting oil and gas development on federal lands while also halting petroleum production from the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska. By suppressing America’s domestic energy sources, the administration has put the country back on a path toward drawing in more imports from foreign nations and from here it gets worse. Along the way toward achieving “net zero emissions” by 2050, Biden is promoting wind, solar and battery storage strategies that will make America more dependent on China. That’s because the components that go into renewable energy are largely manufactured in China. Since the entire Biden plan appears to be crafted toward abandoning America’s natural resources in exchange for Chinese imports, Biden is once again poised to cause more long-term damage to the country than any single cyberattack. 

 In 2019, when the U.S. became energy independent for the first time in 62 years it was celebrated across party lines. Now, America’s energy independence is seen as an “obstacle” to President Biden. Instead, Biden would prefer to push our energy dependence onto foreign nations like China. 

Just this week the Biden administration waived sanctions on the company overseeing the construction of Russia’s Nord Stream 2 pipeline into Germany. Axios reported, “the completion of Nord Stream 2 would be a geopolitical win for Putin and give him substantial new leverage in Europe.”

Not only is Biden actively threatening the United States national security that was achieved through our energy independence, but he is also bolstering foreign nations who Trump went head-to-head with to gain that energy independence. Biden continues to push policies that put the U.S. in a vulnerable position on the world scale, while hurting American citizens in the process.