US Interior Secretary Doug Burgum Talks Gas Prices

SPEAKER_1 (0:02)

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Kailey Leinz (0:07)

And joining us now live from the Convention Center here in Dallas is Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum as we kick things off this evening. Mr. Secretary, welcome back to Bloomberg TV and Radio. Appreciate you joining us in a very loud arena for a second night. Could we begin with this $5,000 Trump dividend suggestion from the president? Are we sending money to taxpayers potentially that taxpayers would be paying for? How would this work?

Doug Burgum (0:38)

Well, Kailey, we can start there, but I do want to thank you and Bloomberg. I know tomorrow you've got a full day of scheduling around 9-11.

Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy and I will be out at Shanksville at the United Airlines, the Flight 93 site, which is now a National Park Service historic site. So, again, appreciate the coverage of that day. And, of course, it's interesting that part of the theme of President Trump last night was we're still fighting battles in the Middle East, and grateful for his leadership. Relative to your question, yeah, the Trump dividend, this is an idea the president's had about how we take the future prosperity of the country and get it back to the American workers. And I think it's, as President Trump has had, this is a big idea, bold idea, a fresh idea. And I think it has a lot of potential because of the upside that we're seeing in America, the record trillions of dollars of direct foreign investment, the lower regulations, the lower taxes, the prosperity that's coming. And President Trump wants to make sure to share that with American workers.

Kailey Leinz (1:39)

Can he do so without the authorization of Congress? He told CBS he thought he could do this on his own. But Mr. Secretary, doesn't the power of the purse lie with your colleagues at the Capitol?

Doug Burgum (1:53)

Well, I think that remains to be seen. And I'm sure President Trump, who just launched this big idea yesterday, perhaps has some ideas related to the revenue that's coming in or the savings that's being generated from other sources. But I'm sure there's many people in Congress that think this is a good idea as well.

And of course, when we look at Congress in the past or Democrats in the past, they promised, hey, we're going to give a trillion dollars of student college debt relief, which is really just to pass to the universities, or we're going to change the rules around healthcare reimbursements, trillions of dollars, or we're going to do the Green New Deal, trillions of dollars over decades of subsidies. So there's been other big ideas that have been pitched out during election years, but I think this one is the first time where President Trump is saying the people that are generating the prosperity, the workers of America, would be the ones that are the recipients.

Kailey Leinz (2:46)

Well, you mentioned a moment ago, Mr. Secretary, that the president has also acknowledged, as we mark the 25th anniversary of 9-11 tomorrow, that there is still a threat posed in the Middle East. He has continually cast Iran as the leading state sponsor of terror, and that's part of the reason why he has started this military pursuit that has escalated in recent days. As it has escalated, Mr. Secretary, as I'm sure you know, we have seen oil prices move pretty substantially higher, and diesel was already marching toward $6 a gallon even prior to the latest moves today. With the moves like what we are seeing with the refining capacity restrictions with diesel in particular, is the US right now considering any kind of export restriction when it comes to diesel?

Doug Burgum (3:36)

Every idea is on the table, but I think the thing that we've got to focus on right now is making sure that we get our domestic production up.

Under the prior administration, there was refining capacity was shrinking.

In extreme cases like in California, where they used to have over 30 refineries, going from eight to seven to six, a place like California importing foreign refined product to meet their needs as a state, when they could be actually refining it there, but through policies at the state level, subtracting from our refining capacity, giving them the highest gas and diesel prices in the lower 48 But yeah, we acknowledge, certainly do, I mean, this is high diesel prices are affecting everyone from farmers to lobstermen. But this is a short term situation because again, President Trump is eliminating a long-term multi-generational issue relative to having a terrorist group or terrorist groups, plural, having nuclear weapons because of course, Iran was funding 24 different terror groups. If they had a nuclear weapon, they wouldn't just keep it to themselves like a country, they would be dispersed across terror groups. And that's a threat to every American wherever they live. And I think the other big picture thing here is which President Trump is asking people to say we're on a track and we are effectively with the actions in the lower 48, with Alaska, with Venezuela, moving the geopolitical center of oil and gas production back to the Western Hemisphere, really, for the first time. And this ensures that America is going to have the lowest priced, most secure energy, the most manufacturing jobs coming back. We're showing that up in the jobs report. Because if you take a look at natural gas, $2.70 for natural gas when Europe is paying 12 and other parts of the country are paying 20 So we're blessed in America to be set up for the decades ahead under President Trump's energy dominance policy to have secure, reliable, affordable energy for manufacturing, for electricity production, and for prosperity.