*Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) appeared on CNBC Wednesday and was grilled about gas prices and inflation and whether Democrats should catch heat over the rising cost of living in the country.
“In this country, we’re still down front from peak production. You don’t you think there’s anything that you can do in Congress or to convince a Biden administration, you don’t think there’s any regulations that need to be eased? You don’t think there’s any offshore activity?” CNBC host Joe Kernen asked Jeffries, Mediaite reports.
“You don’t take any responsibility? It’s just all a ‘Putin price hike’?” Kernen continued.
“Part of the challenge domestically in terms of production is that the oil and gas companies have refused to actually act on the permits to drill that they currently,” Jeffries stated.
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Kernen noted that blaming the oil companies for a lack of drilling is “a red herring.”
“There [are] leases. There’s also just the overall pressure from ESG and the green lobby about whether an oil company is going to make plans five or ten years down the road, when a large part of the population wants to put them out of business completely. So, would you invest hard-earned capital on a five-year project or ten-year project now if you were a fossil fuel company?” the host said.
Jeffries responded, “I mean, it’s not clear to me that the oil and gas companies really care that much about the so-called green lobby. They have made clear in their earnings calls and in their representations to shareholders that they do care about the record profits that they’ve been making on the backs of increased gas prices for the American people. That seems, to me, to be problematic.”
Per The Hill, earlier in the year, President Biden called on oil companies to produce more supply. He also “argued that corporations played a part in inflation, alleging that their pursuit of profits lead to an increase in prices,” the outlet writes.
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