President Biden and Big Oil had a truce. Now President-elect Trump has a deal.
Donald Trump wears a hard hat in support of miners in Charleston, WV, in 2016. (Credit: Mark Lyons/Getty Images)
The oil and gas industry has donated $75 million to Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, the Republican National Committee, and affiliated political committees to support his fossil-fuel-driven vision for the American economy. Thanks in large part to ultra-wealthy oil executives, Mr. Trump’s “DRILL, BABY, DRILL” energy platform will become a reality in 2025, begging the question of not only his ethics, but the future of our climate.
News of these donations comes in the wake of Mr. Trump’s request for $1 billion from the fossil fuel industry at a private dinner with oil executives at Mar-a-Lago. Some attendees of the event anonymously reported that the former President verbally asked for donations in exchange for reduced taxes and legal fees on drilling and mining once he becomes president. While the exchange was no doubt shady, it was likely not illegal under the Supreme Court’s current interpretation of campaign finance laws.
Mr. Trump may have come up short of his billion-dollar goal, but he successfully garnered the support of major oil companies like Chevron and Exxon Mobil and recruited the help of numerous other fossil fuel beneficiaries, including mine operators, shipbuilders, engineering firms, hedge funds and smaller oil producers. In addition to the money directly donated to Mr. Trump’s super PACs, fuel companies and trade groups spent almost $80 million on advertising in swing states.
From an environmental standpoint, a second Trump presidency backed by Big Oil is terrifying. The President-elect has promised drilling access on public lands and in federal waters. He campaigned on pledges to reduce taxes on the fossil fuel industry and eliminate EPA regulations that regulate air pollution. Not to mention, Mr. Trump has historically been skeptical of climate science. He called climate change a “big hoax” on Fox News and has misrepresented the science behind extreme weather events like snowstorms and melting ice caps. In the most comprehensive study on American climate deniers to date, Mr. Trump was shown to be the top influencer on Twitter’s (now X’s) echo chamber of users that don’t believe in climate change. Unfortunately, Mr. Trump - along with his Republican colleagues Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and Senator Rick Scott - has used his platform to fuel the belief that any effort to move away from nonrenewable energy is aimed at emptying the middle class’s pockets and benefitting the Democratic Party’s “woke” agenda.
Mr. Trump has already begun to make good on his end of the deal. He announced plans to redraw the borders of the Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante national monuments in southern Utah to open hundreds of thousands of acres of land to development. He intends to issue new permits on natural gas export terminals and to revoke a longstanding waiver that allows states like California to set stricter pollution standards than the federal government.
While carbon emissions skyrocket and the economy worsens its dependence on dwindling resources, Big Oil will reap billions of dollars in profit. An analysis by the International Monetary Fund found that American fossil fuel companies receive $700 billion of subsidies each year when accounting for federal tax breaks and undercharging of environmental costs. It’s no wonder oil, gas, and coal beneficiaries were willing to make large donations to secure four more years of Mr. Trump in the oval office.
Increased vehicle and power plant exhaust doesn’t just quicken a warming climate. It puts Americans at higher risks of lung cancer and pulmonary diseases by polluting the air we breathe. Burning fossil fuels also releases particulate matter and nitrogen and sulfur dioxides which leads to smog and acid rain. The former depletes the ozone layer, reduces visibility, and spurs lung infections in humans and animals. The latter turns soil infertile, kills aquatic life, and releases heavy metals from the ground into the water we drink.
To rub salt in the wound, Mr. Trump has chosen former New York Representative Lee Zeldin as the next administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. Historically, Zeldin has dismissed clean energy and supported Mr. Trump’s environmental rollbacks. He backed the former President’s 2017 exit from the Paris Climate Agreement and voted against clean water legislation at least twelve times. When he was called out on X by New York Governor Kathy Hochul for voting ‘no’ on the Inflation Reduction Act - a bill that creates thousands of jobs in renewable energy - he tweeted, “I just voted NO because the bill sucks.”
The future Trump administration is in a dangerously powerful position to force rollbacks of environmental regulations and protections so that private fossil fuel companies profit. The President-elect has big promises to fulfill, and none of them are to the environment or the American people.
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