At a dinner for Big Oil executives last year, Donald Trump promised to give the fossil fuel industry essentially anything it wanted in exchange for $1 billion toward his re-election effort. The dinner was organized by Harold Hamm.

The fossil fuel industry went on to donate $96 million directly to Trump’s campaign; spend $80 million on political advertising; and pour God-knows-how-much cash into dark money groups that don’t have to reveal their donors. Most of the fundraisers were organized by Harold Hamm.

After the election, Trump quickly nominated North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum to lead the Department of Interior, which oversees fossil fuel and renewable development on federal lands and waters. Burgum is close personal friends with Harold Hamm.

Trump went on to nominate fracking executive and climate denier Chris Wright to lead the Department of Energy, which oversees energy policy and research. Wright was hand-selected for the position by Harold Hamm.

While most national media has be understandably fixated on Elon Musk’s takeover of the federal bureaucracy, another billionaire’s influence on the Trump administration has slid by largely unnoticed. Hamm, the founder and executive chairman of fracking company Continental Resources, has been instrumental in driving Trump’s full-speed campaign to deregulate the fossil fuel industry and crush its main competition: renewables.

Long-deemed Trump’s “energy whisperer,” Hamm enjoys a close personal relationship with the president. “He’s my original oil guy that taught me so much about oil,” Trump said at a fundraiser last year. The fracking tycoon had dinner with Trump during his New York hush money trial, and offered to help pay Trump’s $454 million bond during his civil fraud case. Hamm also partied with Trump on election night, and toasted with soon-to-be-Interior-Secretary Burgum—who happens to make about $50,000 a year leasing 200 acres of farm land to Hamm’s fracking company.

Now, just weeks into the new administration, Hamm is watching as his personal wish-list is fulfilled. In May, a Trump advisor told the New York Times that Hamm “wants that LNG pause gone, he wants the California waiver and the tailpipe rule gone.” On his first day in office, Trump signed an executive order that targeted all three of those things.¹

In addition, in August, the Washington Post reported that Hamm’s policy priorities for a Trump administration would include “opening up more federal lands to drilling, easing the Endangered Species Act and curbing numerous regulations at the Environmental Protection Agency.” Coincidentally, on his first day in office, Trump’s signed another executive order that targeted all those things, too.²

Hamm also encouraged other oil executives to share their policy priorities with Trump, the Post reported, and they did. Since then, Hamm’s hand-picked Cabinet leaders have issued a slew of Big Oil-approved policies designed primarily to boost fossil fuel industry profits and destroy competition from renewables. They include:

• The Interior Department suspended all clean energy development on federal land, while continuing development for oil and gas. (Heatmap, Jan. 24)

• The Energy Department abruptly stopped paying out grants from its climate and clean energy programs, halting billions of dollars in funding for states and companies to protect the environment and advance renewables. (E&E, Feb. 7)

• Burgum, on his first day as Interior Secretary, issued a seven-page directive weakening protections for national monuments, migratory birds, endangered and threatened species in order to further fossil fuel development. (Inside Climate, Feb. 5)

• Burgum also issued an order reversing the Biden administration’s protection of most of the U.S. coastline and parts of Alaska from oil drilling. (E&E, Feb. 4)

• Wright said the Department of Energy has started re-started the permit consideration process for new liquified methane gas facilities. The process had previously been paused so the government could consider whether the projects were in the best interest of the climate. (Oil and Gas Journal, Feb. 7)

I point out Hamm’s influence in these areas for three reasons. The first is that it’s a necessary, yet often overlooked, way to expose Trump’s lies about his energy agenda. The president and his supporters love to frame Trump’s pro-fossil fuel policies as some sort of benevolent act for ordinary Americans—simply a means to lower inflation. But aside from the fact that that argument doesn’t actually make sense, it’s a distraction from the bigger picture. The primary goal of Trump’s energy policies is to drive profits for Hamm and the other oil billionaires who donated lavishly to his campaign. Let’s keep our eye on the oligarchical ball.

The second is to encourage other media outlets and creators to remember that Musk isn’t the only billionaire whose self-serving actions may have devastating consequences for the rest of us. Dismantling renewable energy development and climate regulation doesn’t just pose a threat to the United States. It poses an existential threat to the ecological and economic stability of the world. This deserves equally frequent and urgent coverage, if not more.

The third is simply to remind everyone that the people destroying the planet have names and faces. Hamm has said he does not want a job for himself in the administration, and enjoys his current set-up, in which Trump “calls on me for advice and help.” This is a clear indication he’d prefer to remain in the shadows. That alone feels worth bringing his influence to light.

Some spare thoughts:

• Hamm is not the only oil billionaire with influence over Trump, he just appears to be the closest. You can read about some of the others here.

• During his Senate confirmation hearing to lead the Department of Energy, Wright said he still stands by previous comments that ‘wildfires are just hype.’

• Seven Democrats in the Senate voted in favor of confirming Wright to lead the Department of Energy, despite Wright’s outspoken climate science denial. They are: Maggie Hassan, Jeanne Shaheen, John Hickenlooper, Michael Bennett, Ben Ray Luján, Martin Heinrich, and Ruben Gallego.

• Wright tried to walk back his climate denial during his confirmation hearing, saying he thinks climate change is real but that global energy poverty is a more urgent issue. This is an incredibly tired and well-debunked talking point. The two problems are not mutually exclusive.

• Wright’s oil services company, Liberty Energy, is public. I don’t know what can be done with that information, but it felt like something worth pointing out.

Other stories I’m following:

• “There is litigation coming for the majority of the executive orders Trump has signed so far that affect the environment, conservation and decarbonizing the economy, several nonprofits told ABC News.” (ABC, Feb. 7)

• “Democratic attorneys general of 23 states, including Colorado, filed a lawsuit last week trying to block the Trump administration’s funding freeze for rooftop solar, efficiency and other clean energy programs.” (OK Energy Today, Feb. 10)

• “Most of the world’s big polluters just blew off a major climate deadline. Major polluters including China and the E.U. failed to submit their national emissions plans to the U.N., suggesting that the global climate framework is wobbling.” (Washington Post, Feb. 12)

• Hannah Einbinder, who stars in the HBO series “Hacks,” won a Critics Choice Award—and used her speech to call out the fossil fuel industry.
  “We are on the brink of a really dark era of climate denial. Chevron scientists knew in the ’70s that plastic recycling was not efficient,” she said. “They knew that only nine percent of plastic is actually recycled, and even from that nine percent, it’s only recycled one time. The fossil fuel industry is to blame for the climate crisis and they need to pay to clean up the mess that they made.”

  

  "I just want to encourage everyone to fight for each other," she added. "Hopefully, we can all use our voices on this issue because planet Earth will be fine. It's humanity that's in trouble."

Catch of the Day: Good girl Phoebe recently had cancer surgery—but she’s still the belle of the ball!

Thanks to reader Ken for the submission.

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