(DCWatchdog.com) – Republican critics have been vocal about their belief that President Joe Biden adopting “the left’s climate agenda created the perfect storm” for Russian President Vladimir Putin to invade Ukraine.
After Biden announced clean energy is the answer to the U.S. reducing its reliance on foreign oil imports in a speech about banning Russian energy imports, Green activists rejoiced.
In his remarks last Tuesday, Biden highlighted that the Russia-Ukraine conflict and its effect on the global oil markets “should motivate us to accelerate a transition to clean energy.”
While progressive groups are leveraging the current crisis to expedite America’s reliance on fossil fuels, Republicans have expressed their belief that green policies are to blame for the crisis.
Rep. Fred Upton of Michigan, who serves on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, revealed the world could not depend on “renewable energy like wind and solar at this point in time,” adding that this premise is “a fact the White House can’t understand.”
He also mentioned that if the Biden administration had continued oil production and “not bent to the whims of the progressive left,” the country “could have easily provided an alternative to Russian energy” to allies, removing the Kremlin’s “ace.”
He added that it is undeniable adopting “the left’s climate agenda, created the perfect storm for Putin to take advantage of,” given the U.S. had abandoned “traditional fuel sources” and failed “to export LNG to our allies.”
Senate Minority Whip John Thune (R-S.D.) also punched a hole in the Democrats’ urgency to adapt electric vehicles amid the crisis as an oversimplification of the issue. He mentioned that the U.S. needs “a federal government that understands the importance of responsible domestic oil and gas development as the foundation of an all-of-the-above energy strategy.”
Thune also acknowledged that “energy security is also a matter of national security,” sentiments shared by House Minority Whip Steve Scalise, a House Energy and Commerce Committee member. In a piece published by Fox News Digital, Scalise wrote that Biden “ending American energy independence and renouncing U.S. oil and gas resources” essentially “played into Putin’s hands.”
Scalise linked Putin’s barbaric attacks on Europe shunning “fossil fuels and nuclear power,” saying, “Through his efforts to make the United States more like Europe, President Biden has ensured that European countries cannot turn to our abundant resources to drive down natural gas prices and cut free from Russian energy.”
