The White House Chief Of Staff Ron Klain, responding to Republicans’ criticisms that the Strategic Petroleum Reserve should be used only for emergencies, stated that he cannot take Republicans seriously. He said that Republicans had told him that he needed to do something about gas price, and then he did something about it. And that Biden has been using the reserve to lower prices for the past year.

Joe Scarborough, co-host, asked: “So Ron, Ron, the President announced we would be releasing 15,000,000 barrels of oil out of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. Republicans, there have been some Republicans who were very critical of the decision. They said that it should not be tapped into except for war, and that the President was doing this because he was not able to win an election in a few weeks. What is your reaction to these criticisms?

Klain replied, “Well, first of all, Republicans said, hey, that he should do something about gas price, and then, we did something about it, and they’re like, well, don’t do that. It’s difficult for me to accept the criticisms seriously. We have a policy of historic releases from the petroleum reserves this year, which has helped to lower the gas price. It fell for 98 consecutive days this summer thanks to these releases. It wasn’t just us. The President tried to convince other countries to do it the same way. India, Japan, and South Korea all released the SPRO. As part of this effort to address the Ukrainian war, we brought the entire world together. All summer, we brought down the gas price by almost $1.50 Then, after the action with Saudi Arabia, it began to rise a little. The President again brought the same tools to this table. Joe, part of that was the release of the reserve. But, he also announced yesterday that he had set a price for refilling the reserve. This gives the U.S. an incentive to continue exploring and producing more. In 2023, we will see record-breaking oil production. As we transition to cleaner energy, we want to increase this responsibly. We believe this country can achieve energy security and a sustainable future. This is the direction America is heading. Yesterday’s announcement by the President was about both the short-term price of gas and the long-term stability of the energy supply.