In her latest detachment from the facts, Lois Eisenberg (March 22) would have us believe the Biden Administration “produced 34% more oil than Donald Trump.” Taking a lead from Joe Biden’s Press Secretary Jen Psaki, what Eisenberg conveniently failed to mention is the oil production figure she cited was a comparison of the two presidents’ first year in office. A more accurate and less deceitful comparison is to compare today’s total U.S. oil production, which is actually lower than in 2018, 2019 and 2020, during Donald Trump’s last three years in office. Under Trump the U.S. was energy-independent and the biggest oil producer in the world at the time. Under Biden we have become dependent on foreign oil exports to meet our domestic energy demand and, as a result, have seen record-high prices at the pump.
Eisenberg then goes on to blame “Republicans and the right-wing media” for falsely accusing Biden of being “at war with fossil fuel.” Again, facts matter. According to the Wall Street Journal (hardly a right-wing publication) Biden is the first president in over two decades who has not held an onshore lease sale. In addition, the Biden Administration has halted lease sales on federal land, suspended leases in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, slow-walked approval of new drilling permits, and placed expensive and onerous new financial requirements on new capital investments in fossil fuel development. To claim, as Eisenberg would have us believe, that Biden is not at war with the domestic oil industry is simply absurd and an escape from the facts and reality.
Max Morgan
Valencia
