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The American People Aren’t Buying The Biden Administration’s Lies About House Republicans’ Strategic Production Response Act

Washington, D.C., January 25, 2023
  • The American People Aren’t Buying The Biden Administration’s Lies About House Republicans’ Strategic Production Response Act

Following more than a year of Joe Biden draining our Strategic Petroleum Reserves (SPR) and risking our national security, House Republicans are bringing to the floor the Strategic Production Response Act to ensure the Biden administration has a plan to increase domestic production following ANY non-emergency drawdown of our SPR.

Instead of working with Republicans to provide energy security for the American people this week, Department of Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm, along with Joe Biden himself, falsely claimed H.R. 21 weakens the administration’s emergency response powers and even DENIED their administration’s prolonged war on American energy.

On Monday, Secretary Granholm said:

“House Republicans are pursuing this agenda that risks worsening the oil supply. It risks raising gas prices for American families and when you consider H.R. 21, it needlessly aims to weaken the strategic oil reserve‘s usefulness as a tool to ensure oil security in America…There is nothing standing in the way of domestic oil and gas production.”

CHARGE AND RESPONSE: (Courtesy of House Energy and Commerce Committee Republicans) 

  • Charge: H.R. 21 would limit the President’s authority to tap the SPR.
    • Response: H.R. 21 has no effect on DOE’s emergency authorities. If the President declares an emergency resulting from a severe energy supply interruption, the Secretary has full authority to utilize the SPR. However, if the President chooses to use the SPR without declaring an emergency – a non-emergency sale – then the Secretary of Energy must prepare a plan to encourage more domestic production.
  • Charge: President Biden’s SPR releases are working to lower gas prices.
    • Response: The SPR releases have not had an impact on gasoline prices. SPR releases send the wrong signal by discouraging oil producers to drill new wells and expand production. President Biden released an unprecedented 250 million barrels, and it had nowhere to go. Our pipelines and refineries are operating at maximum utilization – they are essentially full, so the SPR releases literally have no place to go in the U.S. Instead, these releases of our strategic reserve asset put more oil on the global market, and often end up in China.
  • Charge: President Biden is not depleting the SPR.
    • Response: President Biden sold off an unprecedented 250 million barrels of oil in less than two years, which is more than 40% of the stockpile. Two of the four SPR sites along the Gulf Coast are now dangerously low on oil, leaving America more vulnerable to a true energy supply disruption caused by a hurricane or natural disaster.

MAKE NO MISTAKE: The American people see right through the Biden administration’s false claims. They know they have suffered from Joe Biden’s failed Green New Deal agenda, which has caused the price of gas and utilities to skyrocket. The solution to our energy crisis is not draining our emergency reserves but UNLEASHING American energy, and the Strategic Production Response Act will help us do just that.