Flashback – Joe Biden: ‘I Guarantee You We’re Going to End Fossil Fuels’

Then-candidate Joe Biden said in 2019 that he would “end” the fossil fuel industry in the United States.

“I want you to look at my eyes. I guarantee you, I guarantee you we’re going to end fossil fuels,” he said in New Castle, New Hampshire.

Biden said something similar in 2020 on the Democrat primary debate stage. Biden promised to wage war on the American oil industry by terminating subsidies and drilling feasibility.

“No more subsidies for the fossil fuel industry,” Biden said. “No more drilling, including offshore. No ability for the oil industry to continue to drill, period,” Biden said of his energy policies if he won the presidency. “It ends.”

Biden has made good on his promise. On day one of his presidency, Biden canceled the Keystone pipeline. Biden has also driven up private and public financing costs of oil drilling and halted drilling on public lands.

Also, gas prices have soared for seven consecutive days at over $5 per gallon. According to the Energy Information Administration (EIA), Americans will pay $450 more for gas in 2022 than they did last year on an inflation-adjusted basis.

Instead of taking credit for his policies, Biden has instead told citizens that gas prices are high because oil companies are gouging consumers. On Wednesday, Biden sent a letter to Marathon Petroleum Corp., Valero Energy Corp., ExxonMobil, Phillips 66, Chevron, BP, and Shell, blaming them for the cost of gas. He also requested they produce more oil.

Biden’s communication tactics come as the midterm elections are approaching. Biden’s approval for his management of gas prices is only 27 percent. Additional polling shows that 74 percent of Americans believe Biden’s soaring gas prices are an “extremely/very important” factor in how they will vote in the midterm elections.

Polling by the Convention of States Action/Trafalgar Group also showed that 53 percent of voters believe Biden is trying to raise the price of gas to force citizens to use less fossil fuel.

Follow Wendell Husebø on Twitter and Gettr @WendellHusebø. He is the author of Politics of Slave Morality.