When we learned that Donald Trump hosted a roundtable at Mar-a-Lago with guests from the oil and gas industry, many traditional media platforms reported that politicians make promises at fundraisers. The news reacted in America as if it had never happened before.
Some of the reports reminded me of the famous scene in Casablanca, where a French police inspector declares, “I’m shocked!” I was shocked that gambling was going on here! ”
The meeting, hosted by Oklahoma oilman Harold Hamm, took place on April 11, but most media outlets did not report on it until this week, in what appears to be an almost organic effort to amplify the story. It looked like. The Washington Post beat everyone with its first report on April 17, but reporters from The New York Times, Politico, The Hill, Guardian, Reuters, Axios and others published a second report amid this week’s baiting spree. I decided it was appropriate to submit it. Other Democratic-leaning legacy media outlets are also in the pile.
So what was the big news?Washington Post’s first story It focused on negative comments that Trump is said to have made about the wind industry, including the blunt statement that he “hates wind power.” But is it really new? President Trump’s hostility toward the wind industry has been well known since at least 2015, so what has changed?
in This week has its own story, new york times They complain that President Trump has “publicly criticized President Biden’s energy and environmental policies for months.” But the truth is that Trump has consistently opposed massive debt-based subsidies for wind, solar and electric vehicles since the beginning of his 2016 presidential campaign.
The Times and Post also detail President Trump’s promises to encourage drilling in Alaska, further expand federal lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico, and end Biden’s reckless moratorium on LNG permits. Reporting.
Reporters from these traditional news outlets noted that at the same meeting where they discussed plans to restore balance to federal energy policy, President Trump made a bold and blunt request to executives to support his campaign. Reportedly, $1 billion. Try as you might, you will not be able to find similarly inflammatory reports from the same news outlets related to the Biden campaign’s efforts to raise money from left-wing billionaires with names like Gates, Bloomberg, and Soros. There wasn’t.
While some articles have complained about President Trump’s “transactional approach” to fundraising, the former president has actually been unusually candid on this point. But all these years later, it’s hardly newsworthy because that’s how he’s always communicated in the political arena. (Related: David Blackmon: EPA’s new auto emissions rules reflect King Biden’s madness)
“This is what he sold to everyone,” Mike McKenna, a Washington, D.C.-based consultant who served as president during Trump’s first term, told the New York Times, adding: You may not even like me, but your other choice is to spend four more years with these guys, Biden and his appointees. “The common sentiment among people in the business world is, ‘We don’t want another four years on Team Biden.'”
US President-elect Donald Trump speaks with members of the media at his Mar-a-Lago mansion in Palm Beach, Florida, on December 21, 2016.Reuters/Carlos Barria
Like it or not, this is how American politics works. Individuals, NGOs, unions, businesses, and entire industries tend to donate money to politicians who promise to implement policy measures that best serve their interests. And what’s important to note here is that the promises President Trump reportedly made during this roundtable regarding oil and gas and energy policy in general are essentially This means that they are promising a return to policy direction. This is hardly newsworthy, especially enough to be fodder for so many news organizations working together to expand the story a full month after the event occurred.
Despite having been covering Trump’s political efforts in one form or another for nearly a decade, these Democratic-leaning media operations believe that Trump’s straightforward, transactional approach to politics is actually a great asset to him. I still don’t understand the reality that it exists. It’s as if many journalists have become so accustomed to expecting smearing and obfuscation tactics from politicians that they wonder how they can respond to someone like Trump who treats the process for what it is: a business transaction. I had no idea how to react.
David Blackmon is a Texas-based energy writer and consultant. He spent his 40 years in the oil and gas business, specializing in public policy and communications.
The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.
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