{"id":16031,"date":"2026-05-12T15:11:07","date_gmt":"2026-05-12T07:11:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tingchao.xyz\/?p=16031"},"modified":"2026-05-12T15:11:17","modified_gmt":"2026-05-12T07:11:17","slug":"trumps-crooked-art-of-the-deal-with-big-oil","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tingchao.xyz\/?p=16031","title":{"rendered":"Trump\u2019s crooked \u2018art of the deal\u2019 with Big Oil"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\uff08CARSON, CALIFORNIA \u2013 APRIL 02: In an aerial view, the Marathon Petroleum Corp\u2019s Los Angeles Refinery is seen on April 02, 2026 in Carson, California. Oil prices surged over 10 percent in volatile trading, with both Brent and U.S. crude jumping sharply after President Donald Trump warned of intensified military action against Iran and signaled the conflict could drag on, raising fears of prolonged supply disruptions.\uff09<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The American people have seen several big oil scandals over the last century. We have survived Teapot Dome, the collapse of Enron, windfall profiteering during the 1970s oil crisis, Exxon Valdez, Deepwater Horizon and more. But President Trump\u2019s deal with Big Oil is the most corrupt in our history. Its cost pervades everything from household budgets to public health, national security, the climate, and the future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During his first term and now in his second, Trump has delivered hundreds of billions of dollars in favors to the industry, including tax breaks and subsidies, access to more federal land and waters, a major rollback of environmental regulations, the suppression of competition from clean energy technologies, access to Venezuela\u2019s oil reserves, and of course the very profitable Iran war. No one has stopped him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This arrangement is clearly unethical, if not illegal. That became obvious in April 2024 when candidate Trump offered the oil industry a deal, telling its executives that if they gave $1 billion to his campaign, he would deliver their wish list when he recaptured the White House.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He has been delivering ever since.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The deal betrays the middle- and lower-income voters who helped elect him. By cutting important social programs and safety nets to pay for the oil industry\u2019s tax breaks and subsidies and by raising consumer prices, Trump\u2019s energy policies are transferring wealth from American families to one of the world\u2019s most powerful industries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Oil companies ended up providing nearly $100 million to Trump\u2019s campaign organization and affiliated political action committees, not counting dark-money contributions. They also gave nearly $12 million to Trump\u2019s inauguration and have continued contributing millions more to Trump\u2019s PAC since he took office.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump, meanwhile, has continued making promises. Last July, his One Big Beautiful Bill Act gave oil and gas more than $70 billion in new and expanded tax subsidies through 2034, along with $250 billion in taxpayer-guaranteed loans. This was on top of his 2017 Tax Cut and Jobs Act, which gave 17 oil and gas companies a combined $25 billion in one-time benefits, along with a permanent 40 percent reduction in their tax bills.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nine oil companies reaped at least $1 billion in immediate tax savings. To pay for these windfalls, families got \u201cthe largest cuts to basic needs programs in U.S. history.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2022, during the Biden presidency, the Inflation Reduction Act had provided incentives for electric vehicles that would have spared families from today\u2019s rising gasoline prices. The bill\u2019s incentives for solar and wind power, the cheapest ways to generate electricity, would have helped mitigate rising electric rates. But in 2025, Trump\u2019s beautiful budget bill terminated many of these incentives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, utilities will generate up to 60 percent less clean energy through 2035, and other industries will pay up to $11 billion more for power in 2035, costs that will inevitably pass on to electric consumers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last August, the Trump administration canceled nearly $680 million in funding for offshore wind projects. Trump is now using about $2 billion in tax dollars to pay power companies to abandon offshore wind projects and invest instead in fossil fuels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fossil-fuel pollution causes more than 91,000 premature deaths in America each year, plus hundreds of thousands of illnesses. according to the non-profit Stockholm Environment Institute. Yet the Trump administration is doing the oil industry another favor with at least 145 actions to weaken or rescind environmental rules. \u202f<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Climate instability caused by fossil fuel pollution costs families in some regions over $1,000 annually due to higher prices for energy, food, insurance, property damage and medical care. Billion-dollar disasters, which drive up the government\u2019s need for tax revenues, cost the equivalent of $1,500 per person in 2023 and 2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By the end of April, the Iran war cost taxpayers at least $25 billion. Some analysts estimate it could cost them $1 trillion. The war has resulted in thousands of deaths, including those of 13 U.S. soldiers. Hundreds of GIs have been wounded. It has triggered the worst global energy crisis in history.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile, the 100 biggest oil companies earned more than $30 million in windfall profits every hour during the war\u2019s first month. If oil prices remain elevated, they are expected to rake in $234 billion in extra profits by the end of this year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Political candidates always make promises, but Trump\u2019s seemed to involve a clear quid pro quo. Trump solicited the $1 billion one month after he became the Republicans\u2019 presumptive presidential nominee. Trump\u2019s April 2024 deal with oil executives seemed illegal on its face. It is a felony to solicit or receive anything of value after one is officially informed that he or she will be nominated for public office.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But what is unethical may not be illegal under the U.S. Supreme Court\u2019s campaign finance jurisprudence. As a law expert explained, \u201cUnless Trump wrote on a napkin during the meeting an exact amount of money he wanted deposited in a specific campaign vehicle in exchange for a specific policy goal, there\u2019s little chance it would violate bribery laws as currently interpreted by the Supreme Court.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What is indisputable is that Trump\u2019s relationship with the carbon cartel is like an oil spill spreading through the environment, the economy, consumer prices, the tax burden, and the future. It will take an entirely new Congress to stop the spill and begin the cleanup.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

William S. Becker is a former U.S. Department of Energy central regional director who administered energy efficiency and renewable energy technologies programs. He also served as special assistant to the department\u2019s assistant secretary of energy efficiency and renewable energy. Becker is executive director of the Presidential Climate Action Project.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\uff08CARSON, CALIFORNIA \u2013 APRIL 02: In an aerial view, the Marathon Petroleum Corp\u2019s Los Angeles Refinery is seen on April 02, 2026 in Carson, California. Oil prices surged over 10 percent in volatile trading, with both Brent and U.S. crude jumping sharply after President Donald Trump warned of intensified military action against Iran and signaled […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":16032,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[1724,61],"class_list":["post-16031","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international","tag-trump","tag-usa"],"yoast_head":"\nTrump\u2019s crooked \u2018art of the deal\u2019 with Big Oil - LISTEN WORLD<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/tingchao.xyz\/?p=16031\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Trump\u2019s crooked \u2018art of the deal\u2019 with Big Oil - LISTEN WORLD\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"\uff08CARSON, CALIFORNIA \u2013 APRIL 02: In an aerial view, the Marathon Petroleum Corp\u2019s Los Angeles Refinery is seen on April 02, 2026 in Carson, California. 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