HAGEMAN SLAMS BIDEN/HARRIS ADMINISTRATION’S BUREAU OF LAND MANAGEMENT FOR THEIR ANTI-ENERGY POLICIES

Cheyenne, WY – Today, Congresswoman Harriet Hageman slammed the Biden/Harris administration and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) for their anti-American energy policies in light of the BLM’s offering of just 159 acres at a recent lease sale in Wyoming–netting only $27,000. 

“Wyoming’s economy and the American people rely on access to federally controlled energy resources, yet the Biden/Harris Administration is doing all that it can to destroy our domestic energy industry,” Hageman said after an announcement last week that 2 forty-acre plots in Crook and Fremont counties received zero bids in a Wyoming gas lease sale–a frustratingly minute offering compared to the backlog of deferred leases that remain in the BLM’s queue. “The BLM’s intentional neglect to offer oil and gas leases threatens to drive small Wyoming producers out of business and encourages further reliance on foreign adversaries to produce the energy upon which Americans depend. This, coupled with Democrats' decision to raise bonding fees and royalty rates through the so-called Inflation Reduction Act, underscores the Biden/Harris Administration’s outright hostility toward traditional American energy producers.

“At the beginning of this Congress, the House of Representatives passed H.R. 1, which would have allowed additional access to energy resources by establishing a threshold of a minimum number of lease sales on federal land–enabling Wyoming’s producers to generate affordable and reliable energy for all Americans. When the Senate refused to take up this legislation we tried again in the Department of the Interior appropriations bill.”

“As your lone Congressional Representative, I will not stop fighting against the overburdensome attacks on Wyoming’s lifeblood. We have abundant natural resources, and we should be making them available to our nation as a means to return to energy independence.” 

Background: 

• The Biden/Harris administration offered leases on less than 300,000 acres of public land in 2023 compared to over 11 million acres offered in Trump’s first year in office.
• Expressions of Interest have fallen dramatically in recent years for Wyoming, from a high of more than 2 million acres nominated in 2018 during the Trump administration to just 30,000 acres in 2023, according to the BLM. 
• Democrats' 2022 climate law increased the minimum royalty rate for federal oil and gas production by 33 percent while also increasing the statewide environmental bond — money set aside or secured as insurance to cover clean-up costs if a company goes bankrupt — from $25,000 to $500,000, thereby hitting our small independent producers especially hard.

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