With the midterm elections only three weeks away, Team Biden has decided to raid the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) again, apparently in the hopes of driving down fuel prices sufficiently so that voters won’t take revenge against Democrats at the polls. The SPR was established to serve as a supply of fuel in times of emergency — as in war and other major disruptions — not as a tool to lower fuel prices for political gain.
This past March, President Biden announced that he would be releasing 180 million barrels of oil from the SPR at one million barrels per day. One of the beneficiaries of that move is Communist China, which sucked up nearly a million SPR barrels, even though Biden claimed the releases would go to help American consumers at the pump. The Strategic Petroleum Reserve is now at its lowest point in forty years, as the possibilities of war loom all about us and our energy sector is in a shambles, thanks to the Biden administration’s anti-energy policies. Now the president is selling off an additional 15 million barrels of SPR oil.
Speaking from the Roosevelt Room of the White House on October 19, the president announced that he was authorizing the release of another 15 million barrels of oil from the SPR as a “critical step” to reduce prices. He also attempted to deflect blame from his own energy policies by blaming the oil and gas companies for America’s energy woes. “My message to all companies is this: You’re sitting on record profits. And you’re and we’re [sic] giving you more certainty. So you can act now to increase oil production,” he said.
This is typical Biden scapegoatism. First he blamed Vladimir Putin for shortages and high prices. Last year he blamed mom-and-pop gas station owners, warning them against gouging customers at the pump. He blamed struggling gas station owners again in September of this year. “Bring down the prices you’re charging at the pump to reflect the cost you pay for the product. Do it now. Do it now. Not a month from now — do it now,” he demanded.
But the blame goes to Biden. When he came into the White House, America was flush with oil and natural gas, a near-miraculous turnabout resulting from President Donald Trump’s Make America Great Again energy policies. Not only had we, in a few short years, become largely energy independent, we were exporting oil and gas. President Trump unleashed American energy producers from the oppressive policies of the Obama-Biden administration, enabling them to tap our abundant natural resources.
Biden changed all that. As one of his first actions in office, he canceled the permit for the Keystone XL oil pipeline — and boasted about it. He froze U.S. oil and gas leases and permits. He slammed oil refineries with harsh regulations that are putting many smaller refineries out of business. He continued the Obama-Biden war on coal. He insists that we must get rid of fossil fuels altogether and switch over to “renewables.” He has reversed the Trump administration’s withdrawal from the United Nations Paris Agreement on global warming and is flogging the UN’s climate hysteria for all it’s worth.
Winter Blackouts for New England Add to Woes at the Pump
Not only is the “Biden effect” reflected in unprecedented gasoline and diesel prices, it may soon be felt in rolling electrical blackouts and freezing homes due to shortages of liquefied natural gas (LNG). “New England power producers are preparing for potential strain on the grid this winter as a surge in natural-gas demand abroad threatens to reduce supplies they need to generate electricity,” The Wall Street Journal reported on October 17.
“New England, which relies on natural-gas imports to bridge winter supply gaps, is now competing with European countries for shipments of liquefied natural gas, following Russia’s halt of most pipeline gas to the continent,” the Journal continued. “Severe cold spells in the Northeast could reduce the amount of gas available to generate electricity.”
“Should LNG supplies dwindle during a harsh winter,” reports the Daily Caller, “states like Massachusetts and Connecticut could struggle to generate electricity as a substantial amount of fuel supply will be used to heat homes, according to the region’s grid operator Independent Systems Operator New England (ISO NE).”
The Biden albatross will not help midterm Democratic candidates: spiraling fuel prices, spiraling inflation, spiraling violent crime rates, spiraling border invasion, spiraling DOJ/FBI political attacks on Middle America, spiraling Covid vaccine deaths, and spiraling global tensions equal downward-spiraling Biden approval ratings. The spirals have Biden’s White House handlers and the Democratic Party in panic mode. The Strategic Petroleum Reserve selloff (a national security sellout) is a desperation move, but it is not likely to salvage many votes. Team Biden and their promoters will have to resort to more 2020-style election “irregularities” to avoid getting crushed on November 8.
Related articles:
President Biden Sells U.S. Reserve Oil to Chinese Firm Connected to Son
Biden Did Attempt to Delay OPEC Cuts Until After Midterms
Biden: Americans Will Pay High Gasoline Prices for “as Long as It Takes”
