Alaska Governor Dunleavy Tells Biden He Is Hitting Poor Americans Hardest With Domestic Energy Bans

It didn’t take long for President Joe Biden to cripple energy production in the nation’s largest state that contains 60 percent of all federally owned land. The administration immediately shuttered oil and gas production in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), stopped logging in the Tongass National Forest, and ended land releases to Native veterans, all without even a phone call to Republican Governor Mike Dunleavy.

Dunleavy recently told The Federalist that his office has had no contact with the White House despite repeated attempts. He said he had to find out in the press that the administration held a summit meeting with China in Anchorage earlier this year.

The White House seems bent on turning Alaska into a national park for the wealthy of the world who can afford to visit. Dunleavy says that Alaska would be one of the wealthiest U.S. states “by far.”

During Alaska’s statehood, progressives have exploited native American tribes to cripple economic development in the name of “environmental justice.” Leftists have used the Gwich’in people in ANWR to stop oil and gas production, even though the tribe is hundreds of miles away from the drilling areas. The only tribe living on the 1.6 million-acre drilling area inside ANWAR’s 19.6 million acres are the Inupiat, who have favored energy production projects for many years.

Dunleavy also cited the Pebble Mine project near Bristol Bay as the most disastrous federal intervention against economic development in his state. Prospectors have discovered amazingly vast deposits of copper, gold, and rare earth metals vital to high-tech products and electric vehicles.

The company seeking to develop mining in the area estimates the deposits are currently worth $500 billion and $1 trillion. The regulatory battle over the development of the mine has been ongoing for 17 years.

Repeated denials of proposals, plans, and permit applications by the Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers have been vague and sent conflicting signals over the years.

Dunleavy said there is a “trillion-dollar opportunity” right next to America’s most impoverished, and the state can’t do anything about it.

The governor added that President Trump had been much more open to Alaska economic development. He said that his state went from having a president who was “about creating opportunity” to one who is about canceling it.