Source: ZeroHedge.com
US Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm, whose catastrophic handling of US energy policy will be one of the most memorable and dire consequences of the Biden era, engaged in multiple conversations with the Chinese government’s top energy official just days before the Biden administration announced it would tap the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) to combat high gas prices in 2021, the same China whose Hunter Biden-linked energy giant Unipec, which we previously learned had bought millions of barrels from the SPR release.
Granholm called China National Energy Administration Chairman Zhang Jianhua, a longstanding senior member of the Chinese Communist Party, for a half-hour one-on-one conversation on Nov. 21, 2021. Granholm’s calendar also shows an earlier phone call had been scheduled with Jianhua for Nov. 19 but a rep for the former Michigan governor said the first call never took place. Then, on Nov. 23, 2021, the White House announced a release of 50 million barrels of oil from the SPR, the largest release of its kind in U.S. history at the time.
According to Fox News, Granholm’s previously-undisclosed talks with China National Energy Administration Chairman Zhang Jianhua — revealed in internal Energy Department calendars obtained by Americans for Public Trust (APT) and shared with Fox News Digital — reveal that the Biden administration likely discussed its plans to release oil from the SPR with China before its public announcement in the US: yes, China’s Communist Party learned what Biden would be doing before the US did.
“Secretary Granholm’s multiple closed-door meetings with a CCP-connected energy official raise serious questions about the level of Chinese influence on the Biden administration’s energy agenda,” APT Executive Director Caitlin Sutherland told Fox News Digital, an “energy agenda” that can be summarized with just one chart:
“Instead of focusing on creating real energy independence for America, Granholm has been too busy parroting Chinese energy propaganda and insisting ‘we can all learn from what China is doing,’” Sutherland continued. “The public deserves to know the extent to which Chinese officials are attempting to infiltrate U.S. energy policy and security.”
Hilariously, in response to the leaked calendar, in a statement the DOE said the meeting was broadly part of the agency’s effort to combat climate change, but didn’t share what was discussed at the meeting.
“Solving the climate crisis means engaging with competitors and allies in clear and substantive discussions — especially among the nations emitting the most carbon pollution into the atmosphere,” a DOE spokesperson told Fox News Digital. “We must all address the transnational challenge of climate change to our planet.”
It was unclear just how the DOE is “solving climate crisis” and “addressing climate change” by engaging with China when Chinese CO2 emissions are double those of the US and rising exponentially…
… but that’s irrelevant since the DOE – like every other aspect of the Biden administration – was lying.
As part of its announcement in November 2021, the White House said it was releasing oil from U.S. reserves in conjunction with “other major energy consuming nations including China.” However, President Biden said in remarks after the announcement that China “may do more as well” and Granholm told reporters during a press briefing that China “will make its own announcement.”
What happened next will shock nobody: instead of releasing oil stocks, China aggressively increased its own reserves, and even bought fuel from the US. Meanwhile, SPR releases have weakened U.S. national security and bolstered foreign adversaries’ “geopolitical leverage” according to Republican leaders.
“China ramped up its purchases of crude oil from Russia and the United States to boost its own reserves, even as oil prices surged and President Biden called for a coordinated release,” House Energy and Commerce Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., and former GOP Rep. Fred Upton wrote to Granholm last year.
“As a result, China may now control the world’s largest stockpile of oil, with total crude inventories estimated at 950 million barrels,” they added….