Removing the Deadline for the Ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment--Motion to Proceed

Floor Speech

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Mr. BARRASSO. First, Madam President, I thank my colleagues who are on the floor today--Senator Tuberville for his leadership, Senator Budd, and Senator Ernst--for their efforts in the protection of women and girls in sports. As a doctor, I share their concerns, share their passion in terms of fairness, in terms of safety, and I congratulate them on their efforts and continue to join them in those efforts to provide the protection for women and girls in sports. Energy

Madam President, I come to the floor today to talk about the high price of Democrats' misguided energy agenda. It is a high-price crisis entirely of President Biden and the Democratic Party's own making.

Last year, when energy prices were already at historic highs, what did Democrats do? Well, they voted 10 times--time after time after time--against increasing American energy production. Instead, Democrats jammed through the Senate and the House the largest climate bill in American history. The climate extremists applauded this.

Let me just say, hold the applause, because the American public is suffering. Families all across this great land are hurting. Democrats' reckless spending in the past 2 years has driven up the cost of energy and, of course, as everyone knows, this has fueled inflation.

Inflation reached a 40-year high because of Democrats' spending. Prices today are over 15 percent higher than they were the day Joe Biden took office. Energy prices have gone up even more than that. Americans are paying 36 percent more for energy today than they were in January of 2021. Gas prices to fill the tank are up 46 percent. That is a 5-month high. They are going to continue to go up during this summer's driving season.

The lower gas prices that the administration desperately and irresponsibly depleted our Nation's Strategic Petroleum Reserve to achieve last year has hurt our economy and has hurt our country and has hurt our national security.

Democrats were wrong to raid our emergency supplies of petroleum products in a desperate attempt to lower gas prices leading up to the November 2022 elections.

The Strategic Petroleum Reserve is our Nation's emergency reserve. Now it is out of gas. It is down to the lowest level it has been at in 40 years. Not refilling it. Oh, no.

Joe Biden knew we needed more energy than that. So he went on bended knee to foreign dictators, begging them to produce more oil to help lower gas prices here in America but not letting us produce it here at home--and we have plenty.

This President did everything he could to try to lower gas prices except the thing the American people know would work, and that is to produce more American energy. So American families are once again facing that double whammy of an energy crisis coupled with an inflation crisis.

Democrats are doing absolutely nothing to help solve the problem. Remember, the Biden administration began working on day No. 1 to choke off America's energy resources: killed the Keystone XL Pipeline, canceled oil and gas leases.

America's energy revolution turned us into the world's energy superpower. Our economy had a wonderful, competitive advantage. It is good for families, good for workers.

We challenged dictators without having to worry about our energy supply. We had affordable, reliable, and available American energy. This administration and the Democrats in this body squandered the gains that we had achieved.

They attacked American oil, natural gas, and coal at every turn along the way. Then they raised taxes to make it even more expensive. They instituted burdensome regulations to make it more difficult to produce the American energy.

They have put up roadblock after roadblock on every type of American energy. And yet Joe Biden and the Democrats, open-mouthed, looked with surprise: Why have the prices skyrocketed?

Anybody could have predicted that choking off our energy supply would lead to record-high energy prices and to increase dependence on our adversaries--Russia, China, Iran, Venezuela.

Last week, Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm testified before the Energy Committee. I specifically asked her about the administration's plan to lower gas prices and energy prices across the board, because they are up across the board. They are up for heating energy; they are up for driving energy.

Her solution: government mandates, phase out anything powered by oil, natural gas, or coal. Take away our gas stoves, take away our gas- powered water heaters, force-feed us expensive electric cars that don't work for many people across the country.

They may be OK for rich people in the big cities who don't have to drive very much, who can afford to pay $16,000 more for a vehicle than for a traditional car. But for Wyoming families and Wyoming farmers and Wyoming ranchers, they just don't work.

People want affordable, reliable vehicles. And for people all around rural America, electric cars are not it.

Americans don't support the Democrats' climate extremism. Look at the polls. Nearly two-thirds of Americans say they don't want to buy an electric car. They don't want to be force-fed by Joe Biden. They don't want to have the government in the driver's seat.

They say the price is too high. It is $64,000 on average. The batteries are unreliable. Charging them is inconvenient. It is time- consuming. It takes a long time to get a battery charged, and it can't go all that far.

And then who benefits from all of this? China. That is because most of the critical minerals that are needed to build these batteries come right out of China. Just look for the ``made in China'' sticker on the batteries of the electric vehicles.

This country should be focusing on strengthening our energy independence, not finding ways to become more dependent to China or Russia.

So the reality of Secretary Granholm's so-called solution to lowering prices is that Americans will just pay more; not really concerned about affordability, but I didn't hear that word at all.

The way to lower prices is to unleash American energy. Now, the House recently passed legislation to do just that. And I support their efforts.

Senator Capito and I are going to soon introduce our own legislation in the Senate. The Energy and Natural Resources Committee is going to hold a hearing on the critical issues in the coming weeks.

We can only unleash American energy if we fix our broken permitting system process. Right now, new energy projects are bogged down by a maze of redtape and lawsuits.

Our legislation is going to include enforceable timelines on environmental reviews and filing legal challenges. We are going to move forward faster with an all-of-the-above American energy agenda. We need it all.

My Democratic colleagues have stated before that they do want permitting reform. Well, we will see. They are going to have an opportunity to speak up and to vote; because if they are serious, real reform is possible. If they are serious, we can tell the American people that real relief is on the way.

We do need a long-term commitment in this country to American energy. Making life more affordable for every American should be a bipartisan priority. It hasn't been for the first 2 years in the Biden administration and now going into the third.

We need to get back to a point where we can make energy affordable, available, and reliable--instead of focusing, as the Democrats do, on only renewable energy, regardless of the cost and regardless of the consequences.

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