Two months later donald trumpDuring ExxonMobil’s presidency, the oil industry had reason to be pleased with Republican control in Washington, DC. The former CEO of ExxonMobil had just been confirmed as Secretary of State; Congressional Republicans agreed to make things easier for oil giants hide payments to foreign governments; and the new Republican administration was already taking steps to roll back all types of environmental safeguards.
It was in this context that the White House issued a press release trumpeting ExxonMobil’s decision to expand investments in several projects on the Gulf Coast. Like Mother Jones uncoveredSome of the statement included language that was effectively identical to the language in Exxon’s own press release – leaving Team Trump and the oil company on the same page in a very literal sense.
Seven years later, the problem is metastasizing: Politico reported this week that oil industry executives are now drafting presidential executive orders, hoping that Trump will simply sign them if/when he returns to the White House.
Matthew Davis, vice president of federal policy at the League of Conservation Voters and former EPA scientist, told the politician that an industry writing the exact language for a new president to sign is “beyond the pale,” adding, “It’s not shocking, but perhaps a little bold and rude that the oil industry is writing language for executive orders.”
In fact, this is not the only “gross” connection between Team Trump and Big Oil. The Washington Post also reported at a recent meeting at Mar-a-Lago, where the former president sat down with some of the country’s top oil executives, who complained about “burdensome” environmental safeguards.
According to the Post communicatingwhich has not been independently verified by MSNBC or NBC News, the presumptive GOP nominee told oil executives that if they raised $1 billion to put him back in power, it would be a good “deal” for the industry because they would end up earning more than that in profits thanks to Trump’s policies on taxes and regulations.
It’s true that the former president wasn’t talking about a real bribe, but the Republican’s message wasn’t exactly subtle: big oil companies raise billions of dollars to elect Trump and Trump, in turn, will eliminate environmental safeguards and provide incentives taxes on the industry.
This, of course, is the same Republican who also took the unusual step of stating, more than once, that took steps to deliberately increase gasoline prices to help oil industry profits.
President Joe Biden’s re-election campaign responded to the report with a statement that said in part: “In a nutshell, this is Trump’s corrupt MAGA agenda: Trump acting like a puppet for his biggest donors – giving them tax breaks and favorable policies while working families get screwed.”
I’m aware of the fact that the definition of the word “populist” can sometimes be amorphous, but the next time someone uses it to describe Trump, remind them of this story. An oil billionaire organized a meeting at the former president’s glorified country club, where Trump gave an unabashedly transactional speech to oil executives, whom he hopes will help put him in the Oval Office, when he will realize his anti-environmental dreams.
He is not a “man of the people,” unless the “people” in question are wealthy Big Oil elites.
This post updates our related previous coverage.
This article was originally published in MSNBC.com
