Former President Trump vowed Saturday to slash U.S. energy costs in half if re-elected, seizing on oil and gas policies to draw a sharp contrast with Kamala Harris in the crucial swing state of Pennsylvania.
Speaking to voters at a rally in State College, Trump vowed to lift the U.S. pause on U.S. liquefied natural gas export terminals, embrace fracking and otherwise undo what he described as the “disastrous” energy policies enacted under the Biden administration.
“Starting on day one of my new administration, I will end Kamala Harris’ war on Pennsylvania energy,” Trump told the crowd. “And we will frack, frack, frack.”
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People wait in line to enter a Trump campaign event in State College, Pa., Saturday. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)
Fracking, the process of using pressurized fluids to extract natural gas from shale rock, is a controversial technology and one Harris previously pledged to ban when seeking the presidency in 2019.
But fracking is necessary to access the vast gas resources tucked away in Pennsylvania. The state is not only a pivotal battleground state with 19 electoral votes. It’s also the second-largest natural gas producer in the U.S.
Although Harris has repeatedly reiterated her support for fracking on the campaign trail this election cycle, some Republicans and gas groups have sought further assurances from the campaign as Election Day draws closer, citing the four years of mixed messaging they saw under Biden.
In the absence of that clarity, Trump has attempted to fill in the blanks on Harris’ policies himself.
Supporters of former President Trump attend a campaign rally in State College, Pa., Saturday. (Charly Triballeau/AFP via Getty Images)
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Harris, he said Saturday, has been against fracking “her whole life.” She’s been against “anything having to do with anything underground,” Trump told the audience.
“She’ll build a windmill,” he said, “to kill all your birds.”
Trump blamed Harris for what he views as the Biden administration’s failures on U.S. oil and gas production, including its outsize focus on electric vehicle manufacturing and production, the shuttering of aging power plants and the spike in energy prices, which increased by as much as 50% in the Keystone State.
He described the U.S. natural gas export pause, ordered by President Biden in January, as “Kamala’s ban.”
During a second term, Trump pledged, all that would change.
Former President Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, listens as Zain Retherford speaks at a campaign rally at the Bryce Jordan Center Saturday, in State College, Pa. (Associated Press)
“Your energy prices will be cut in half within 12 months from Jan. 20, which is when we would take over,” he told the packed stands of supporters, who responded with roars of applause.
Some had been lined up outside the central Pennsylvania arena for hours to hear Trump speak, long before the doors opened at noon, almost six hours before he eventually danced his way onstage.
Several attendees said they’d been waiting since dawn to see Trump, and the promises made by the former commander in chief did not seem to disappoint them, if their cheers were any indication.
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“We’re going to fix it very fast,” Trump told the audience. “Kamala broke it, and I will fix it.”
Democrats, he said, “waged a war on your commonwealth like never before.”
“They annihilated your steel mills, decimated your coal jobs, assaulted your oil and gas jobs and sold off your manufacturing jobs to China and other foreign nations all over the world.
“You’re going to come back under the Trump administration.”
Trump vowed to remedy what he described as the “disgusting failures” of the Biden administration in the energy sector and beyond.
“This will be America’s golden age,” he said, “and every problem facing us will be solved.”