Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris said in Tuesday evening's debate that she would not ban fracking but offered no explanation for her departure from a 2019 pledge to do just that.
"Let's talk about fracking because we're here in Pennsylvania," Harris said. "I made that very clear in 2020, I will not ban fracking. I have not banned fracking as vice president of the United States and in fact, I was the tie-breaking vote on the inflation Reduction Act, which opened new leases for fracking."
In late July, shortly after Harris was selected as the Democrats' presumptive presidential nominee, a campaign official indicated that Harris would not ban fracking as president. The campaign's statement and her comments Tuesday, though, directly contradict Harris's vows to ban fracking during the 2019 presidential primary.
"There’s no question, I’m in favor of banning fracking," Harris said at a CNN town hall. The then-senator even joined the Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon for a segment two weeks later, stating that she would finally put "an end to fracking once and for all."
While running for Senate four years earlier Harris remarked that she was "very skeptical" of fracking, the Sacramento Bee reported.
In September 2016, as attorney general of California, Harris sued the Obama administration for issuing an environmental assessment opening the door to offshore fracking off the state's coast. According to her office, the assessment failed to recognize "substantial evidence" about the dangers and "unique risks" posed by fracking.
"The U.S. Department of Interior's inadequate environmental assessment would open the door to practices like fracking that may pose a threat to the health and well-being of California communities," Harris said at the time. "We must balance our energy needs with our longstanding commitment to protecting our natural resources and public health."
Harris's position on issues related to fracking and energy production will come into focus in swing states like Pennsylvania, the nation's second-largest natural gas producer behind only Texas and the home to tens of thousands of fossil fuel industry jobs. The debate Tuesday was held in Pennsylvania.
And while Harris did vote for the Inflation Reduction Act and its modest oil and gas provisions, the Biden-Harris administration has offered substantially fewer acres for fossil fuel leasing than previous administrations stretching back decades, according to a recent Washington Free Beacon analysis. For example, it has issued 671 leases for the purpose of onshore drilling, a staggering decline of 84 percent compared with the Trump administration's first three years in office.
"Despite VP Harris trying to pretend she's been consistently in favor of fracking, American, and especially Pennsylvanian, voters know it's a recent stance meant to win an election," Kathleen Sgamma, the president of the Western Energy Alliance, said in a statement to the Free Beacon earlier this month.
A 2021 Department of Energy report concluded that a fracking ban would lead to a 244 percent increase in natural gas prices, kill 7.7 million jobs, reduce U.S. GDP by $1.1 trillion, and lead to $950 billion in labor wage losses.
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