The Biden administration Wednesday said it was canceling three major offshore oil lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska's Cook Inlet, The Hill reports.
A spokesperson for the Interior Department said the roughly 1 million-acre sale in the Cook Inlet would not move forward due to insufficient industry interest.
"The Department also will not move forward with lease sales 259 and 261 in the Gulf of Mexico region, as a result of delays due to factors including conflicting court rulings that impacted work on these proposed lease sales," the statement added.
Frank Macchiarola, a top official with the American Petroleum Institute, said the cancellation of the Cook Inlet lease was "another example of the administration's lack of commitment to oil and gas development in the U.S."
"The president has spoken about the need for additional supplies in the market, but his administration has failed to take action to match that rhetoric," Macchiarola told CBS News, adding that politically it would play "not well."
"In the kind of price environment that we're seeing, there are negative consequences to shutting off oil and gas development, both politically and practically," he said.
The decision comes as gas prices in the U.S. have reached record highs. Environmentalists praised the move, while Republicans voiced dismay.
"I'm glad Cook Inlet belugas won't be forced to face even more oil drilling in their only habitats, but much more must be done to protect these endangered whales from offshore drilling," Kristen Monsell, legal director at the Center for Biological Diversity, told The Hill in a statement. "To save imperiled marine life and protect coastal communities and our climate from pollution, we need to end new leasing and phase out existing drilling."
Rep. Bruce Westerman, R-Ark., said the administration's decision was a sign of its "blatant disregard" for Americans struggling with inflation.
"I can't imagine a more tone-deaf, shortsighted decision that jeopardizes our economic and energy security without doing a single thing to help the environment or the American people," he wrote in a statement.
Solange Reyner ✉
Solange Reyner is a writer and editor for Newsmax. She has more than 15 years in the journalism industry reporting and covering news, sports and politics.
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