Thursday on FNC’s “Your World,” Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-AK) criticized the incoming Biden administration’s approach to the environment, which would cripple the oil and gas industry if fully enacted.
Sullivan told Fox News host Neil Cavuto the policy, which bans energy extraction on some federal lands, will drive up Americans’ energy costs.
“Look, it’s a policy that doesn’t make any sense,” Sullivan said. “Heck of a first week for President Biden, massive layoffs for hardworking Americans in the energy sector, and then targeting energy production, one of our strengths, one of our great American strengths. That’s only going to drive up costs for families, for businesses, and it’s going to drive up imports from countries like Venezuela, Russia. So, it’s a policy that doesn’t make sense. And we’re working hard to get the president to realize that he’s really damaging not just the economy but the American worker during a pandemic and a recession. It makes no sense.”
The GOP lawmaker scoffed at the green energy pledge from Biden administration officials, argued that such industries did not apply to his state of Alaska.
“I think you listen to him, you listen to Gina McCarthy, it’s condescending, and it’s really cavalier, this idea that, hey, you need to make better choices,” Sullivan continued. “The secretary of energy nominee talks about jobs being sacrificed. First of all, these are really important jobs. These are the men and women in Alaska and America that built our country, energy independence. They have to pay mortgages. They have to pay tuition. And there’s this fallacy that somehow a wind turbine technician has the benefits and the pay that somebody, for example, working on the North Slope, does.
“And it’s just not the case,” he continued. “I have talked to a lot of our union leaders in the building trades. They completely reject the idea that these jobs are equivalent or that these jobs even exist. So, right now, you have an administration targeting people, putting them out of work when there’s no job to replace their jobs. And I think that, again, it’s a huge mistake that we need to fix. And the administration needs to come around and make sure they’re focused on jobs during this recession.”
Follow Jeff Poor on Twitter @jeff_poor
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