Biden's Energy Secretary Quietly Consulted with China Days Before Heavily Criticized Move
When President Joe Biden’s administration released tens of millions of barrels of oil from the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve in 2021, why did the Chinese Communist Party potentially hear it from the energy secretary before the American people did?
That’s the question being posed by government watchdog group Americans for Public Trust, which obtained Department of Energy calendars for November 2021, according to Fox News.
According to the internal calendars, Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm had two one-on-one conversations with China National Energy Administration Chairman Zhang Jianhua on Nov. 19 and 21 of that year.
On Nov. 23, Granholm and the administration announced their intention to release 50 million barrels of oil to fight higher energy prices.
Yet, the DOE isn’t releasing any details about what was discussed in the meetings, only saying that officials were focused on the “climate crisis.”
In a White House news briefing on Nov. 23, Granholm said that “energy prices at the pump and at home are too high” and that the “administration realizes that people are seeing this every single day as they go to work, as they fill their cars with gas,” according to a White House transcript.
“We’re taking these steps, obviously, because we have to meet the immediate need of affordable energy and protect families from further pain at the pump. Oil prices have not been this high in seven years,” Granholm said.
“And to be clear, the president is prepared to use every appropriate tool to ensure that Americans have access to affordable energy today.”
China would go on to receive a significant portion of the oil released from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, leading to criticism from the GOP, which argued that U.S. national security was weakened by the releases while autocracies used the releases to bolster their own petroleum stockpiles.
“China ramped up its purchases of crude oil from Russia and the United States to boost its own reserves, even as oil prices surged and President Biden called for a coordinated release,” read a 2022 letter to Granholm from House Energy and Commerce Chairwoman Cathy McMorris Rodgers and then-Rep. Fred Upton, both Michigan Republicans.
“As a result, China may now control the world’s largest stockpile of oil, with total crude inventories estimated at 950 million barrels,” they wrote.
At the time, outrage over the move was pounced upon by mainstream-media fact-checkers, who took issue with conservatives who were dissatisfied that a significant portion of the oil released was being gobbled up by China.
“What matters for the price of oil is how much oil there is — not who has it,” insisted Washington Post fact-checker Glenn Kessler, running his usual damage control for the administration.
“Indeed, every oil industry analyst we contacted was puzzled by the fact that the recent sale to China suddenly was controversial.”
One is hardly surprised that every energy sector analyst in Kessler’s contact list just happened to back up his version of events; even if this were true at a purely abstract level — and the relative success of Russia’s oil and gas blockade raising European energy prices while Moscow still sells to China and India tells us this isn’t quite so simple as Kessler or his oil industry analysts might want us to believe — the amount that went Beijing’s way should be examined afresh now that Granholm’s discussions with Jianhua are public knowledge.
“Secretary Granholm’s multiple closed-door meetings with a CCP-connected energy official raise serious questions about the level of Chinese influence on the Biden administration’s energy agenda,” Caitlin Sutherland, executive director of Americans for Public Trust, told Fox News.
“Instead of focusing on creating real energy independence for America, Granholm has been too busy parroting Chinese energy propaganda and insisting ‘we can all learn from what China is doing,’” she added.
“The public deserves to know the extent to which Chinese officials are attempting to infiltrate U.S. energy policy and security.”
Yes, well, good luck trying to get the Biden administration to cough up answers; relatively speaking, transparency hasn’t been one of the 46th president’s strong points (remember “I have never spoken to my son about his overseas business dealings,” anyone?), and that lack of transparency extends to his Cabinet.
And, lo and behold, the Department of Energy insists that the meetings with Jianhua were part of efforts to alleviate climate change — although it refused to provide any details about specific discussions that were had or whether the SPR release was on the table.
“Solving the climate crisis means engaging with competitors and allies in clear and substantive discussions — especially among the nations emitting the most carbon pollution into the atmosphere,” a Department of Energy representative told Fox News.
“We must all address the transnational challenge of climate change to our planet.”
Right. This was clearly just a friendly discussion about climate change with a CCP-linked Chinese energy official — just two days before a major release from the SPR. That’s what we’re supposed to believe, according to the DOE representative charged with issuing that tissue-thin statement to the media.
What’re the odds? Unfortunately, they’re probably the same as getting a straight answer from Granholm or anyone else in Joe Biden’s Cabinet.
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