Manchin says Biden should be proud of energy ‘success’ story

Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), a moderate Democrat who has often been at odds with the Biden administration over energy policy, offered rare praise for the president Monday amid high levels of energy production. 

“I want to congratulate President Biden for the record-breaking energy production we are seeing in America today. The United States is producing more oil, gas and renewable energy than ever before,” Manchin wrote in a Washington Post op-ed. 

Presidential policies generally have a limited impact on U.S. oil production, but because most of the drilling in the U.S. occurs on private lands and is done by private companies, market forces are typically the biggest driver of American fossil fuel production.

Manchin, in his opinion piece, touted energy legislation passed during the administration, specifically the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and the Inflation Reduction Act. 

The former included investments in the electric grid and bolstered a program to speed the approval process for energy projects; the latter provided tax credits for renewables and alternative energy sources — and required the administration to continue oil and gas drilling on public lands and waters if they want to produce renewables there.

Manchin wrote in his piece that the administration should be touting the carbon-free energy and the high oil and gas production — which has reached record levels in recent months.

“It seems some of the president’s radical advisers in the White House are so worried about angering climate activists that they refuse to speak up about these accomplishments,” he wrote. 

The oil and gas boom is a tough issue for Biden because part of his base — the environmental left — does not support increasing U.S. production. But his opponents often blast his energy policies as not doing enough to promote oil and gas, so touting high production levels could blunt some of that criticism. 

The writing comes as Manchin has sought to push the administration to tack further to the right on energy issues, and has been an opponent of Biden’s policies like the recent pause on some approvals for new natural gas export projects. Manchin has also repeatedly blasted the administration’s interpretation of the Inflation Reduction Act’s tax credits as overly broad.