Gas prices are beginning to inch back up, something which prompted President Joe Biden to lash out last week at energy companies.
However, two Daily Caller contributors recently argued that instead of looking for scapegoats, Biden should try looking in the mirror.
Biden’s policies have weakened energy production
“Amid global instability, wildly fluctuating energy markets and rampant inflation, the president fails to realize that government policies and regulations have made matters worse,” Joe Trotter and Lee Schalk wrote.
“When state and federal lawmakers begin crafting energy and environmental policies, they need to understand that imposing more government control hampers market innovation,” the authors noted.
Since taking office, the president has pursued several policies that critics say have been harmful to the energy industry.
These include canceling the Keystone XL pipeline, limiting drilling on federal lands, and creating a new permitting process for companies seeking to build new pipelines or upgrade existing ones.
Trotter and Schalk went on to contend that Democrats at the state level have done damage as well, noting, “States in the Northeast are among the most victimized by bad government energy regulations.”
“It is no coincidence that Connecticut, Rhode Island, Maine, Vermont, Massachusetts and New Hampshire all fall within the top ten most expensive states for electricity, and all have some form of a cap-and-trade energy scheme, a round-about way of taxing energy production, thus making it more expensive,” they stated.
President tells gas stations to lower prices
Still, none of those facts prevented Biden from laying blame on gas stations during a White House Competition Council meeting this past Monday.
“We haven’t seen the lower prices reflected at the pump though. Meanwhile, oil and gas companies are still making record profits — billions of dollars in profit. My message is simple,” he said.
“To the companies running gas stations and setting those prices at the pump: Bring down the prices you’re charging at the pump to reflect the cost you pay for the product.
“Do it now,” the president insisted. “Do it now. Not a month from now — do it now. And it’s going to save people a lot of money.”