McCarthy's comments followed the bipartisan passing of H.R.1, the Reduce Energy Prices Act, in the House earlier that day.
By making it easier to obtain drilling permits for oil and natural gas on federal lands and offshore, the law hopes to boost domestic energy production. Also, Biden's ban on hydraulic fracturing on public property would be lifted.
House Majority Leader Steve Scalise has stated that the bill will make it simpler to secure mining permits in the United States for the minerals used in the fabrication of microchips and the construction of batteries for electric vehicles.
Scalise stated that the shift in policy was necessary to reduce the United States' reliance on China, which produced 75% of the world's lithium-ion batteries for EVs in 2021 compared to only 7% produced domestically.
If the bill reaches his desk, though, President Joe Biden said Monday that he will veto it. One would be a step in the wrong direction. Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer called the plan, which has been mockingly dubbed "H.R. 1," a "partisan, dead-on-arrival and unserious approach for addressing America's energy needs" earlier this month. 1.”
On Thursday, a reporter asked McCarthy if he was open to negotiating on the bill's "political" and "contentious" provisions.
The speaker shot back, wondering what the big deal was with reducing energy costs and decreasing reliance on China and Russia. "[Biden] has decided that he is willing to risk the economy. McCarthy said, "I don't know what else I can do."
If I worked at the White House, I'd volunteer to deliver lunch. If that's what he prefers, I can make it really soft. The speaker's remark that "it doesn't matter" was met with laughs from the legislators in the room.
What it takes to make the deadline. 'It's not right if people don't sit down and meet together,' he says now, although he never used such words previously, as McCarthy pointed out. Perhaps McCarthy was alluding to Biden's well-documented fondness for ice cream when she made her soft food remark.
"I came down because there was chocolate chip ice cream," Vice President Biden reportedly told a White House meeting on Monday. As an aside, my entire fridge is stocked up there. What, you take me for a fool? Not me," he clarified.
Given that he was speaking so soon after the Nashville school massacre, in which six people were killed, many people regarded his effort at humor to be insensitive. Biden has done a lot of damage to the American energy sector since he started office in January 2021. The Keystone XL project was canceled as a result of his executive actions, and oil and natural gas drilling on public lands came to a near halt.
Under Biden, U.S. oil production remains roughly 1 million barrels per day below what it was before the pandemic began in 2019. According to the US, daily U.S. production of oil dropped from 13 million barrels in November 2019 to 12.1 million barrels in December 2022. EIA stands for the Energy Information Administration. The average price of a gallon of gas has increased by more than a dollar since Biden became president.
What Biden has proposed amounts to a tax hike for all Americans. Since almost all products require energy to make and transportation to market, the price consumers pay includes the cost of fuel.
If Biden is concerned about the welfare of the American people, he will sit down with McCarthy and work to roll back McCarthy's misguided policies that have hampered energy production.
