Congressman Robert Aderholt released the following statement on Monday criticizing President Joe Biden for the worsening diesel fuel shortage impacting several states in the southeast, including Alabama.
“My staff and I are closely monitoring the current issues with the diesel fuel supply in the Southeast,” Rep. Aderholt said. “It’s no secret we are in this situation because of President Biden’s failure to focus on American energy. European nations, because of overzealous green energy policies, are already feeling the pain of these type problems, and now the Biden Administration is following suit here in the U.S., with the same results. I’m ready to do what I can to help ease the impact of any diesel shortages in Alabama. I also recently sent a letter to President Biden, with many of my Republican colleagues, urging him to put together a five-year energy plan to ensure that these types of shortages and price hikes never happen again.”
Diesel is essential to the U.S. trucking industry and agriculture. Farmers are trying to finish harvesting their fall crops and are having to pay prices approaching $6 a gallon for fuel. On October 14, the Energy Information Administration (EIA) reported that the United States had only 25 days of diesel fuel left in tanks and fuel storage depots – this even as the Biden Administration was in the process of releasing the last oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.
Republicans, like Aderholt, have blamed Biden and his controversial Green New Deal policies for the fuel shortage, which threatens to further exacerbate both the supply chain bottlenecks and inflation.
Patrick De Haan, who heads petroleum analysis for GasBuddy, however, told Newsweek that Biden is not to blame for the current low inventories.
“Biden is not to blame—this is due to lack of refining capacity, which has fallen 1 million barrels a day, primarily due to COVID-19 in 2020 curbing demand,” De Haan said. “Hurricane Ida badly damaged a refinery in 2021, and an explosion took out the Philadelphia Energy Solutions refinery in Pennsylvania in 2019. This is simply not enough refining capacity exacerbated by Russia’s war on Ukraine and countries looking for supply elsewhere that isn’t Russian.”
The Administration has diverted some diesel shipments that were bound for Europe back to the United States in an effort to avoid running out of fuel by Thanksgiving. The decline in American refining capacity may not be Biden’s fault, but he and his party, however, control the Whitehouse and both Houses of Congress, and Americans are increasingly frustrated by the rising prices and the high interest rates. Republicans hope that those frustrations will spill over to the November 8 midterm elections. Republicans are encouraging a red wave to give them back control of the House as well as increase their strength in state legislatures across the country.
“We are here on election eve, and I am so excited by what we are going to see here Tuesday,” said Aderholt, predicting a Republican wave election on Tuesday.
“If we are going to put this nation back on the right track, we are going to have to do it by putting in Republicans from the top to the bottom of the ballot,” said Republican nominee for U.S. Senate Katie Britt. “We have to stand up and fight for our children and grandchildren, or they might not have much left to fight for.”
Robert Aderholt has represented Alabama’s Fourth Congressional District since 1996. On Tuesday, he faces challenges from Democratic nominee Rick Neighbors and Libertarian nominee Johnny Cochran.
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