Energy Firms Unload On Biden’s ‘Attack’ On Fossil Fuels In Anonymous Survey

A host of energy companies sharply criticized the results of President Joe Biden’s sweeping climate agenda in an anonymous quarterly survey administered by the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.

The Dallas Fed administers the anonymous survey at the end of each quarter to assess the attitudes of more than 100 energy firms headquartered in parts of Louisiana and New Mexico, as well as all of Texas, about the overall business environment in which they operate. The responses to the third quarter’s installment, released Wednesday, paint a bleak picture for the energy sector and slammed Biden’s sweeping climate agenda for its detrimental effects on energy independence and affordability.

That the respondents spoke more critically and candidly in the anonymous survey than they might in public statements is no coincidence, Dan Kish, senior fellow for the institute for Energy Research, told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “When you’ve got an administration that is going after Elon Musk, the message is clear … people are afraid of their government, so they won’t say in public what they will say in private,” Kish said.

Several common themes emerge among many of the responses. The main gripes with the Biden climate agenda include a stringent and unpredictable regulatory environment, restrictive federal land use policies, a worsening financial environment for investment and concerns that the administration is underestimating the degree that society will need to depend on fossil fuels going forward, even if a widespread green energy transition is to occur over time.

“Increased regulation is affecting our business. In a business full of uncertainty, one thing is certain, and that is the administration wants to destroy the American oil and gas independent producer,” one respondent wrote. “Uncertainty due to the attack on the oil and gas industry by the administration is an issue affecting our business. The country cannot get to green without oil and gas for many years into the future,” responded another.

Biden pledged as a candidate for the presidency in 2019 that his administration would “end fossil fuels.” In addition to the Inflation Reduction Act, which unlocked hundreds of billions of dollars to subsidize green energy projects and technologies, the administration has pursued a massive regulatory agenda that stymies fossil fuel development while taking numerous actions to curtail extractive use of federally-controlled lands.

“The present administration, claiming global warming and harm done by the fossil fuel industry, will maintain higher prices. They now cannot release our strategic reserves due to a huge drawdown,” another respondent wrote.

The White House did not respond immediately to a request for comment.