In November 2021, President Joe Biden proudly announced an order to release millions of barrels of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.
"Today’s announcement reflects the President’s commitment to do everything in his power to bring down costs for the American people and continue our strong economic recovery. At the same time, the Administration remains committed to the President’s ambitious clean energy goals," the White House released in a statement at the time.
"He's used the biggest tool at his disposal, which is our Strategic Petroleum Reserve, releasing a million barrels per day to try to stabilize supply," Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm touted in July.
The SPR is an emergency reserve typically tapped during natural disasters, times of war and limited extraordinary circumstances. Biden started its depletion for political purposes in an attempt to lower gas prices -- ahead of a midterm election -- while continuing to handcuff oil producers.
The use of the reserve hasn't worked to significantly gas lower prices and with continuing daily releases, SPR levels are getting alarmingly low.
Not a meme stock or a collapsing currency, this is America's Strategic Petroleum Reserve, and this is before today's record release of 8.4mb, the largest ever. pic.twitter.com/yodSXxdjoO
— James Lavish (@jameslavish) September 12, 2022
As bad as the inflation data is, the numbers would be worse if Biden hadn't depleted the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.
— Tom Cotton (@TomCottonAR) September 13, 2022
Biden is trading away energy security for short-term political benefit.
Not to mention much of the released supply has been sold off to foreign countries, including to adversaries like China.
"More than 5 million barrels of oil that were part of a historic U.S. emergency oil reserves release aimed at lowering domestic fuel prices were exported to Europe and Asia last month, according to data and sources, even as U.S. gasoline and diesel prices touched record highs," Reuters reported. "The export of crude and fuel is blunting the impact of the moves by U.S. President Joe Biden designed to lower record pump prices."
The White House confirmed once that President Biden has plans to refill the reserve. However, officials did not give details about when or how much it would cost taxpayers with current and expensive oil prices.