Unlocking Our Domestic Lng Potential Act of 2025

Floor Speech

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Mr. PFLUGER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of my legislation. I am proud to offer H.R. 1949 today, Unlocking our Domestic LNG Potential Act.

It has been a long time coming. For 4 years, we suffered as a nation under the Biden administration's disastrous energy policies that put our energy security and the security of our allies at serious risk.

The White House launched a whole-of-government assault on American energy production: slow-rolling permits; killing infrastructure projects, like pipelines; and, most importantly, pandering to radical climate activists. Then they delivered perhaps the most damaging and egregious move of all: They banned new exports on LNG. This wasn't to help the environmental laws or to lower prices for American families. It was to satisfy the radical green activists.

Let me be clear that this ban put politics over people by jeopardizing the American economy and handing Vladimir Putin a lifeline as our European allies were forced to scramble for energy. That was not leadership. That was failure.

It gets worse. After independent experts uncovered major flaws in the study used to justify the freeze, the Biden administration doubled down, and senior officials deliberately hid reports that completely contradicted their argument.

The administration knew the truth, and they hid it. They buried it.

Mr. Speaker, the American people deserve the truth that exporting American LNG strengthens our country. U.S. LNG exports replace dirtier fuels from adversaries like Russia and Iran. In fact, during Biden's LNG export ban, Russia overtook the U.S. as the lead supplier of gas to Europe. In no world was this good for the American consumers or our allies.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to say that Republicans and Democrats have similar goals, but that is just not true. We had 4 years to study this. We had 4 years of evidence on this. Democrats want to kill hydrocarbons, plain and simple.

Republicans are moving to lower prices, and anybody who knows this industry, anybody who has studied this industry, and anybody who has been to where this industry happens, knows for certain that this is a good bill because they understand not just the economics of it, but they understand the long-term implications of this industry. If Members vote against it, they are telling me and the American people one thing: They haven't studied this industry.

Gas exports strengthen our economy. They stabilize prices, and they drive much-needed investment in energy infrastructure that bolsters our energy security.

The facts are clear: We must reform the broken approval process and unlock LNG's potential. My bill does exactly that. It eliminates the politicized DOE, which was weaponized by the previous administration, and gives FERC sole authority over that authorization process.

This is common sense. FERC already leads the review of LNG facilities under section 3 of the Natural Gas Act. It completes the environmental work. It completes the technical review. It completes the full analysis. We are cutting the red tape.

This is promises made, promises kept. The Unlocking Our Domestic LNG Potential Act removes that red tape and replaces it with a streamlined, transparent process that gives producers certainty, strengthening global energy security, and lowering the cost for all of our domestic consumers.

We have to depoliticize the export process. Once again, when the Biden administration banned LNG exports, they weaponized and they politicized that aspect, but today we have the opportunity to stand with American families and businesses and lower the cost and restore energy dominance.

This legislation should be an easy, bipartisan bill. If you support affordable, reliable energy, then this bill strengthens our economy. It lowers prices, and it signals that you have studied the industry and that you know your facts.

Mr. Speaker, I urge all my colleagues to support this and am proud to offer H.R. 1949.

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