Senator Barrasso: Biden Making USA Dependent On Chinese Mining

Wyoming's Senator John Barrasso blasted the Biden administration Thursday for allowing China to be “a big player” in American energy.

“If we follow President Biden’s agenda, Americans will become even more dependent on China and Russia,” Barrasso said during a hearing on President Joe Biden’s budget request for the Energy Department in fiscal year 2024. “These countries control the complete supply in so many ways of the minerals used in the renewable and battery technologies President Biden favors. We have many of these minerals right here in the United States. But this administration has actually blocked access to them.”

Biden Inflation Reduction Act, which the president later admitted had little to do with reducing inflation, was signed into law in August.

The act included a tax credit for electric battery production and tax credits for various energy-efficient appliances and electric cars.

But the Environmental Protection Agency threw a wrench into this plan on Jan. 31 by blocking the mining of 1.4 billion tons of copper, gold, molybdenum, silver, and rhenium in Alaska in order to protect salmon.

So if America can't mine for what it needs in America, where can it go?

“President Biden would rather get these minerals from China than mine and process them here at home,” Barrasso added.

Senator Barrasso then pointed out that the Chinese company, Microvast, was slated to receive $200 million from the Department of Energy despite its reported ties to the Chinese Communist Party, according to the Washington Free Beacon.

“I think many Americans are asking themselves the question: Why is Joe Biden rewarding a country that contributed to the deaths of more than 1.1 million Americans and nearly seven million people worldwide, and why is the White House saying that China is a big player in our energy policy?” Barrasso asked Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm.