President Donald Trump is eager to restart the Keystone XL Pipeline project, which was axed in one of former President Joe Biden's first executive orders, Just the News reported. The Department of Energy estimated Biden's move cost $9.6 billion in revenue and as many as 59,000 jobs.
Trump championed the pipeline project during his first term and committed to new permits after Biden wasted no time in halting the project. It's unclear whether investors will want to take the risk again, but Trump is enthusiastic about reversing Biden's edict.
“I know they [the pipeline owners] were treated very badly by Sleepy Joe Biden, but the Trump Administration is very different — Easy approvals, almost immediate start! If not them, perhaps another Pipeline Company. We want the Keystone XL Pipeline built!” Trump said on his Truth Social Tuesday.
According to the Associated Press, the project began in 2010 under then-President Barack Obama but has faced several setbacks since. After years of waffling during the Democratic administration, Trump was the first to give the green light through permits.
However, Biden canceled the project on the day he took office, Jan. 20, 2021. It was a hardship that lasted for years for some of the people involved in the project, such as pipeline construction foreman Neal Crabtree.
"It did surprise us when it happened. I was upset over it. I literally cried about it. I was a foreman on one of the compressor stations. We'd been there for three weeks," Crabtree, who was on the Nebraska section, told Fox News two years after the order to cancel it.
"We were excited to start this project. You know, we have to work to keep our insurance hours going, we have to work to build our retirement," he continued.
"And when you just spent a whole year [during the COVID-19 pandemic] not working and then we think we got this huge project that's going to provide millions of man-hours for people in our industry and then the rug is pulled out from under you, it was devastating. It was numbing, I can tell you that," Crabtree added.
In contrast to his predecessor, Trump signed an executive order, "Unleashing American Energy," on his first day in office. He committed to regaining ground Biden ceded with many environmental initiatives and executive orders.
"America is blessed with an abundance of energy and natural resources that have historically powered our Nation’s economic prosperity. In recent years, burdensome and ideologically motivated regulations have impeded the development of these resources, limited the generation of reliable and affordable electricity, reduced job creation, and inflicted high energy costs upon our citizens," the order explained.
"These high energy costs devastate American consumers by driving up the cost of transportation, heating, utilities, farming, and manufacturing, while weakening our national security. It is thus in the national interest to unleash America’s affordable and reliable energy and natural resources," the executive order said.
One of the many promises was to "facilitate the permitting and construction of interstate energy transportation and other critical energy infrastructure, including, but not limited to, pipelines..." This will not only help the energy sector but also ease inflation.
Trump is committed to fixing what Biden broke in the nation with his horrible policies. This project can now get off the ground with Trump at the helm and ready with the permits as Americans cheer him on.
