Energy Questions for Tonight’s Presidential Debate

August 23, 2023

As we gear up to watch the first Republican presidential debate, we look forward to hearing what each candidate will say about the energy sector. We have endured the Biden Administration’s war on domestic energy production for almost three years, and voters need to know where each candidate stands.

Here are four questions that should be answered tonight:

1. Despite less than 1 in 10 Americans calling it a pressing issue, Joe Biden has said climate change is the greatest threat we face and has placed it at the forefront of every federal agency. How serious of a threat is climate change? What priority would your administration give climate change?
   
2. Russia has used natural gas to threaten our European allies, yet America could produce enough natural gas for us and them. Do you support an infrastructure to produce, transport and ship liquefied natural gas LNG to our allies around the world?
   
3. China controls around 90% of the rare earth element market, and these materials are needed for all high-tech and military equipment. America has access to these natural resources, but the Biden Administration has prohibited their extraction. Would you support the opening of mining operations across America to weaken China’s market dominance?
   
4. Green groups have annual operating budgets of billions of dollars from undisclosed sources. In 2020 the Trump Department of Justice (DOJ) announced an investigation into foreign funding of these groups. As president, would you support an investigation into the foreign funding, particularly Russian and Chinese, of American environmental groups?

Power The Future Founder and CEO Daniel Turner recently wrote a column for the Daily Caller discussing how seriously each candidate should take the energy issue and offering some advice to our next president. 

“The next president’s energy policy should be a simple one: get out of the way. In 2019, we enjoyed record energy production, low prices, more jobs and revenue to the Treasury, and we even cut emissions. All of this without a “mandate” from DC. We did not hear about “greed” or “profiteering.”

“We can return to better days, cheaper goods, less inflation, but the next president needs the political will not just to reverse but uproot the Biden administration’s war on energy.“Drill baby drill” is a slogan easy to say on the campaign trail, but in this campaign the American people must see which candidates are just talk and which actually have a serious energy policy and the political will to implement it.”