Biden Continues to Fail as Climate Champion with More Broken Promises on Oil and Gas Leasing

WASHINGTON – Today, the House Natural Resources Energy and Mineral Resources subcommittee held an oversight hearing on emissions impacts from oil and gas leasing on public lands. This comes as the Biden administration continues selling off public lands and waters to the oil and gas industry, despite the President’s campaign pledge to ban new leasing and take swift climate action.

Nicole Ghio, Senior Fossil Fuels Program Manager at Friends of the Earth, issued the following statement in response: 

Nearly a quarter of U.S. climate pollution comes from the extraction and burning of fossil fuels on public lands. We are grateful that Representative Lowenthal recognizes the link between climate and fossil fuel leasing. Unfortunately, too many elected officials proclaim themselves climate leaders while continuing to sacrifice our public lands to the oil industry. This includes President Biden, whose long-awaited dud of a leasing report failed to appropriately account for climate impacts. Biden has beyond broken his promise to end new leasing by holding the largest offshore lease sale ever in the Gulf of Mexico and posting over 700,000 acres of potential onshore lease sales for February 2022.

Communications contact: Brittany Miller, (202) 222-0746, [email protected]