With just eight months until the presidential election, Donald Trump leads in most of the polls. This is just the right moment for Democrats to get antsy about President Biden’s environmental agenda.
Deadlines for a “pileup of unfinished environmental rules” are rapidly approaching. Although climate change has been a constant focus of Biden’s administration, most of his loftier campaign promises remain unfulfilled, and time is running out.
The polling all points to public discontent with the economy. Over 60 percent of Americans believe the state of our economy is getting worse. This time, there’s one person squarely to blame — the occupant of the Resolute desk.
And Biden’s crusade against fossil fuels is perhaps the number one driver of persistent inflation, causing continued financial hardship for most Americans.
So in his fourth State of the Union address, Biden had a lot less good news to share than he let on.
Since his first day in office, Biden has made no apologies about targeting the energy industry with draconian regulations, intentionally designed to drive up costs and prevent fossil fuel businesses from succeeding. On his first day in office, Biden rejoined the controversial Paris Agreement, killed the Keystone pipeline and froze drilling on federal land. Just one week later, he issued a litany of anti-energy executive orders. He hasn’t stopped in the years since.
It’s no wonder energy costs are through the roof, along with the overall cost of living. Inflation is voters’ biggest concern, and the price of energy affects the price of everything we buy. Energy is essential to everything we do and every component of our economy — agriculture, manufacturing, construction, transportation and even technology. Just as Biden has tried to blame inflation (and more recently “shrinkflation”) on the callousness of big corporations, it is the result of his own policy choices.
Ironically, even if Biden managed to step up his game and ram all of his environmental priorities through before November, even his wildest climate policy dreams wouldn’t have a meaningful effect on our environment or global temperatures. In all likelihood, it would make matters worse. Research continues to show that electric vehicles (EVs) are worse for the environment. People unable to afford high natural gas bills will return to using dirty fuels to cook and heat their homes. Maybe they can get some wood from the forest being cleared in Michigan to build a Chinese EV factory. But I digress.
America is already a world leader in environmental quality. Contrary to antiquated visions of factories pumping toxic smog into the air, the U.S. has cut air pollution by nearly 80 percent over the last 50 years. That progress has been consistent across Republican and Democratic presidencies and Congresses, driven less by politics than by free-market innovation and the development of advanced pollution control technologies.
Few countries can match our air quality, which is now so clean it’s nearly indistinguishable from natural levels. The few countries that can match us are tiny by comparison in both population and GDP.
If anything, Biden’s pending environmental rules will make air quality worse, not better, by exporting manufacturing and energy production to China and other countries with abysmal environmental records.
And when it comes to climate change, Biden’s efforts are similarly futile. The same statistical models that climate activists use to cry that the sky is falling also show that eliminating all fossil fuels nationwide would cut global temperatures by less than a tenth of a degree. It’s hard to argue that bankrupting the nation and destroying the energy resources we depend on would be worth it for such a minuscule shift. What the climate science actually shows — as opposed to the clickbait climate headlines — is that warming is likely to remain mild and manageable while our resilience continues to improve.
If all Biden’s environmental efforts are for naught and economic issues are more likely to drive voters to the polls, his best bet is to abandon his climate crusade entirely. The easiest solution for our environment and our economy is to proudly support America’s oil, gas and coal producers. No other country produces energy as efficiently, affordably and responsibly. And no other policy decision could have as meaningful an impact on Americans’ everyday lives as rolling back Biden’s harsh, but ultimately pointless, environmental regulations.
With November drawing closer, it’s difficult for even the most fervent anti-Trumpers to resist a bit of nostalgia, reminiscing about $1.99 gas and saving $2,500 a year in energy costs.
It only remains to be seen if Biden will listen.
Jason Isaac is CEO of the American Energy Institute and a senior fellow at the Texas Public Policy Foundation. He previously served four terms in the Texas House of Representatives.