Vice President Kamala Harris is facing growing pressure from within her own party to lift the Biden administration's moratorium on liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports, saying the moratorium could cost the Democratic Party presidential candidate a key state of battle in Pennsylvania – a natural gas powerhouse. .
Pennsylvania's 19 electoral votes The White House is considered crucial to victory. Its reputation as a slightly left-leaning swing state, which former President Donald Trump won by a razor-thin margin of just 0.7% in 2016, is somewhat complicated by its status as a major producer of fossil fuels.
“It’s clear that the path to the presidency runs through Pennsylvania,” Amanda Eversole, chief operating officer at the American Petroleum Institute, told Fox News Digital.
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Kamala Harris and a lone bomb near Bakersfield, California. (Getty Images)
A chorus of Democrats now criticizing the moratorium is almost up from January, when the Biden administration first ordered a temporary suspension of new LNG exports, citing the need to better assess the environmental and economic impacts of such projects.
Now, nine months later and less than a month until Election Day, Harris is under pressure from some Democratic lawmakers and industry leaders to halt the split entirely.
Critics of the disruption argue that removing or delaying US LNG supplies from the market deprives European buyers of a clean, low-emissions energy source – forcing some countries to turn to Russian gas or coal.
It could also affect relations with the US, American energy leadership and investment in major national projects in the coming years.
Pennsylvania is the second largest producer of natural gas in the United States, after Texas. Its gas reserves lie behind shale rock and are expected to be extracted by hydraulic fracturing – a technology considered highly controversial by many on the left and which Harris has recently supported.
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The fossil fuel industry supports more than 423,000 jobs in Pennsylvania and contributes more than $75 billion to its economy. As expected from PwC. Therefore, the future of the LNG industry is very important to most voters, industry group leaders and former DOE officials told Fox News in several interviews.
In fact, the Pennsylvania Democratic Senate delegation, Senso. Bob Casey and John Fetterman, Lawmakers were among the first to criticize the LNG moratorium following Biden's announcement earlier this year. His House opponents have followed suit as they seek re-election in competitive districts.
However, Dave McCormick, the Republican candidate hoping to replace Casey this fall, criticized Democratic incumbents for not doing enough to protect energy interests in the state. A spokesperson for Casey's office pointed Fox News to the senator's previous letter and comments opposing the LNG moratorium.
UM Recent Polls A poll released by API this month found that 85% of Pennsylvania voters wanted to hear more from Harris and Trump about their energy policies.
To date, Harris has declined to comment on whether she will lift the LNG moratorium, and neither the campaign nor the White House have responded to Fox News' requests for comment.
The Asia Vision LNG carrier is docked at the Cheniere Energy Inc. terminal in Sabine Pass, Texas. (Lindsey Janis/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
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If Harris wants to sever ties with Biden or push to end the hiatus and release more production, API's Eversole says Harris needs to make that clear — and fast.
“If it is really going to be different from the Biden administration, then how specifically?” Eversole said.
Rhetoric, he said, is not enough. Especially when private investors in the US have also pulled out of some projects in recent months, citing regulatory uncertainty.
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“We have to put shovels in the ground,” Eversole said. “We need to be able to build more infrastructure, we need to move safely, we need to be able to move our products, and we need to be able to make long-term investments.”
