Exclusive: U.S. oil industry seeks unusual alliance with Farm Belt to fight Biden electric vehicle agenda

By Jarrett Renshaw and Stephanie Kelly  

© Reuters/Jason Reed FILE PHOTO: FILE PHOTO:

 E85 Ethanol biodiesel fuel is shown being pumped into a vehicle at a gas station in Nevada, Iowa

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The U.S. oil industry is seeking to forge an alliance with the nation's corn growers and biofuel producers to lobby against the Biden administration's push for electric vehicles, but is so far meeting a cool reception, according to multiple sources familiar with the discussions.

The effort marks an unusual attempt by the petroleum industry to cozy up to its long-time rivals, reflecting the scale of its concern over President Joe Biden's sweeping measures to combat climate change and tamp down fossil fuels.

While the oil industry and biofuels producers are natural competitors for space in America's gas tanks, they share a desire to ensure a future for internal combustion engines.

The effort also reflects the rapidly shifting political landscape in Washington: the oil industry's once-mighty influence has waned since Biden replaced Donald Trump as president, but the farm belt remains a vital and powerful political constituency.

The American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers oil refining trade group confirmed it has been contacting state and national representatives of the corn and biofuel industries in recent weeks to seek support for a policy that would reduce the carbon-intensity of transport fuels and block efforts to provide federal subsidies for electric vehicles.

That proposal would be an alternative to Biden's stated goal of electrifying the nation's vehicle fleet and would ensure a continuing market for liquid fuels like gasoline and corn-based ethanol.

AFPM met in mid-January with some corn and biofuel industry lobbyists and some member refiners are hoping to host another meeting in February to discuss the future of liquid fuels.

"This whole idea was going to have to take a whole lot of time to gel, but we have made some progress," said Derrick Morgan, senior vice president at AFPM.

The industry's push to change the course of electric vehicle policy faces big headwinds: California has announced a ban on internal combustion engines by 2035, other states are considering similar measures, and auto-maker General Motors on Thursday announced it will produce only electric vehicles by then.

Geoff Cooper, head of the Renewable Fuels Association, a leading biofuel industry trade group, confirmed RFA representatives were invited to participate in the February meeting, but said his organization had not yet decided whether to attend.

"We weren't born yesterday and we're not going to let the oil industry play us like a fiddle," he said. "They have a long history of pushing surrogates and proxies to the microphone to do their dirty work and we're not interested in that."

The National Corn Growers Association is also considering whether to send staff the February discussion, according to two sources familiar with the matter.

NCGA CEO Jon Doggett told Reuters no such meeting had been scheduled, and distanced his group from the idea of an oil-corn alliance. "I have nothing to do with any refining groups. We haven't talked," he said.

Asked if any of its state-level member organizations were considering attending, Doggett replied, "We have dozens of groups. I can't know what all of them are planning."

Sources said the biofuel and corn industry is reluctant to join with the oil industry on this issue not just because of its longstanding rivalry with refiners, but also because it does not want to publicly oppose the energy policies of the new president.

WHIPLASH IN WASHINGTON

The refining sector enjoyed a seat at the table under former President Donald Trump, who was keen to bolster the oil and gas industry.

Biden marks a complete reversal. He entered the White House promising measures to restrain the oil industry, from pausing new drilling leases on public lands to contemplating tougher limits on emissions.

Biden this week pledged to buy 645,000 electric cars for the government vehicle fleet as part of a broader plan to advance EVs through vehicle procurement, infrastructure development and subsidies, threatening the multi-billion dollar gasoline market.

AFPM's Morgan said refiners are not scared of electric vehicles but dislike rigid government mandates. "What we have a problem with are heavy-handed mandates that take away consumer choice, either altogether or in large part. We don't think that's the right way forward," Morgan said.

The oil industry believes carbon emissions from fuel can be reduced by requiring increased octane content, which makes gasoline burn cleaner. Ethanol is a popular octane booster.

The U.S. Renewable Fuel Standard currently requires refiners to blend biofuels like ethanol into fuels. As a result, most gasoline sold in the United States has about 10 percent ethanol in it. The biofuel industry has been pushing hard to ensure those mandates continue.

"It's no surprise the oil industry all of a sudden wants to give us a bear hug. We produce lower carbon fuels. They don't," said Emily Skor, head of the biofuel group Growth Energy.

(Re

Why anti-vaxxers are gaining ground amid the coronavirus pandemic

“There are many layers here and I think what the anti-vaxxers are doing is preying on those layers,” said Erica DeWald of Vaccinate Your Family.

By Anagha Srikanth | Jan. 28, 2021 THE HILL

Story at a glance 

VIDEO https://thehill.com/changing-america/well-being/prevention-cures/536388-why-anti-vaxxers-are-gaining-ground-amid-the?jwsource=cl

As the United States is scrambling to distribute the COVID-19 vaccine, misinformation is thriving.
While an increasing number of Americans have been willing to be inoculated against the coronavirus, some remain hesitant.

The anti-vaccination movement has continued to push its cause throughout the pandemic.

Despite commitments from Facebook, Youtube and other online platforms to combat COVID-19 misinformation, new rumors keep popping up almost as soon as others are shut down. So how do you get ahead in what seems like an endless game of Whac-a-mole?

“We have to separate out two strains here, the traditional anti-vaccine groups and leaders and your layperson who has their concerns about this being a new vaccine that was developed and approved quicker than your average vaccine,” said Erica DeWald, the director of strategic communications and partnerships for Vaccinate Your Family.

The groups that make up the larger anti-vaxxer movement in the United States were organizing even before a vaccine was developed, growing their social media audience and online reach. Leaders like Robert Kennedy Jr., who most recently falsely suggested a link between Hank Aaron’s death and the COVID-19 vaccine, can be extremely wealthy and some have even profited off of the movement.

So when the coronavirus pandemic hit, DeWald said, “they saw it as their opportunity to finally push their agenda into the mainstream and how they decided to do that was by teaming up with people who were against COVID-masking requirements and lockdowns.” United by anti-government sentiments, some anti-vaccine advocates even found themselves at the insurrection at the United States Capitol on Jan. 6.

But not everyone who expresses anti-vaccine sentiments is necessarily part of the larger movement. Despite being disproportionately harmed by the coronavirus pandemic, Black and Indigenous Americans are especially likely to be skeptical of a vaccine as a result of racism and even abuse in the medical community.

A new documentary produced by Kennedy and other leaders speaks to this history, but also makes misleading comparisons between the COVID-19 vaccine and the Tuskegee Experiment.

“They’re filling the void. That's what anti vaxxers do best, they fill in the void of information,” said DeWald. “You have an entire country that doesn’t talk about institutional racism in the medical community and here they are.”

Racism in the medical community persists to this day, starting at the foundation of many health care professionals’ educations. Half of white medical trainees believe such myths as Black people have thicker skin or less sensitive nerve endings than white people, reported the Association of American Medical Colleges in 2020, many based on outdated and outright racist studies. But DeWald said that history is only part of the problem.

America is changing faster than ever! Add Changing America to your Facebook or Twitter feed to stay on top of the news.

“Are they not getting a COVID-19 vaccine because of that mistrust or are they not getting a COVID-19 vaccine because if they have a bad reaction they don’t know that they can get medical care for that reaction? There are many layers here and I think what the anti-vaxxers are doing is preying on those layers,” she said.

The rollout of the vaccine itself has been problematic, with early data showing that Black, Hispanic and other people of color make up a smaller share of vaccinations compared to their share of cases and deaths, while the opposite is true for white people. Even this information, however, is incomplete because many states are not releasing racial breakdowns of the data to the public.

The lack of transparency is a big reason that public health advocates are losing out to anti-vaxxers, noted DeWald. While the anti-vaccine movement is largely tainted by misinformation, they’ve been successful in pointing out that vaccination is a choice and finding common ground through buzzwords such as “informed consent.”

Groups like the Black Coalition Against COVID-19 have begun this work already. In Michigan, a statewide initiative to improve health literacy saw more than 1 million residents obtain health coverage through the state's expanded Medicaid program. But laying groundwork for health literacy is no easy process.

“It comes down to person to person communication,” she said. “It’s about listening, acknowledging that their concerns are legitimate and real and answering them and I think what that means for the country is to actually start the process of community outreach.”

Warren calls CNBC reporter's 'bluff' on rich leaving US over wealth tax
BY JORDAN WILLIAMS - 01/28/21 

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) called a CNBC reporter’s “bluff” after the reporter suggested that wealthy Americans would leave the U.S. over a new tax.

Warren appeared on CNBC’s “Closing Bell” on Thursday, in which she discussed how levying a two-cent tax on the richest families in America would raise enough money for causes such as universal childcare and universal free college

After hearing her remark, host Sarah Eisen said the tax “might also chase wealthy people out of this country as we’ve seen has happened with, with other wealth taxes.”

“You just said how much we need the economy to be revitalized right now for companies to start adding jobs and not subtracting them anymore,” Eisen said.

Warren then pushed back on Eisen, saying “someone has to pay to keep this nation going right now,” and doubled down on her argument for taxing the “the top one-tenth of one percent” to fund more universal causes.

“What they want to do, is not only keep their wealth, they want to keep building their wealth faster than anyone else,” Warren said. “All I’m saying is can we have just, just a little fairness here? A two-cent wealth tax so that we can have universal childcare—”

“I’m just presenting the counter argument,” Eisen said interrupting Warren.

“Well, how about a counter argument though, based on fact?" Warren responded.

“The wealthiest in this country are paying less in taxes than everyone else,” Warren said. “Asking them to step up and pay a little more and you’re telling me that they would forfeit their American citizenship, or they had to do that and I’m just calling her bluff on that. I’m sorry that’s not going to happen."

 VIDEO https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/5cl36404-warren-calls-cnbc-reporters-bluff-on-rich-leaving-us-over-wealth-tax?jwsource=

CHATTEL SLAVERY
Protests erupt in Poland as near-total abortion ban takes effect
BY JOSEPH CHOI - 01/28/21 


© Getty

Nationwide protests have broken out across Poland for the past two nights in response to a near-total ban on abortions.

Protests are taking place after a new restriction took effect following a ruling from a top court three months ago that stated it was unconstitutional to abort a congenitally damaged fetus, The Associated Press reports.

As the AP notes, fetal malformations were the cited cause for around 98 percent of legal abortions in Poland.

Women at the protests this week, led by women’s rights group Women’s Strike, reportedly said the new restriction made them not want to get pregnant at all.

“The state wants to further limit their rights, risk their lives, and condemn them to torture,” said Adam Bodnar, a top human rights official in Poland whose office is independent of the government, according to the AP.

With the new restriction taking effect, abortions can now only be performed in cases of rape or incest or if the life or health of the mother is at risk.

“Today is a terrible day for women and girls in Poland," Esther Major, a senior research adviser at Amnesty International, said in a statement.

Major called the new restriction "the latest in a coordinated and systematic wave of attacks on women’s human rights by Polish lawmakers."

The AP reports that members of the Law and Justice Party, the ruling party in Poland that is aligned with the Roman Catholic Church, argued the latest restriction was put in place to prevent the abortion of fetuses with Down syndrome. Such abortions make up a large portion of abortions in Poland, the news outlet noted.

Cheney offers bill to prohibit suspension of oil, gas, coal leases

BY TAL AXELROD - 01/28/21 

© Bonnie Cash


Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) introduced two bills Thursday seeking to block the White House plan to pause leases for oil, gas or coal on federal lands, a key part of its expansive climate change platform.

Cheney, the No. 3 House Republican and the representative of a major fossil fuel-producing state, said the Safeguarding Oil and Gas Leasing and Permitting Act and the Safeguarding Coal Leasing Act would force the Biden administration to obtain a joint resolution of approval from Congress before implementing any federal moratorium on oil and gas leasing or permitting or coal leasing.

The bills are similar to one from Wyoming Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R), which is also likely to be formally introduced Thursday.


“The executive actions from the Biden Administration banning new leasing and permitting on federal land endanger our economy and threaten our national security. The legislation I am introducing today would safeguard against these damaging orders, and prevent the job loss, higher energy costs, and loss of revenue that promises to come with them,” Cheney said in a statement. “These bills will defend the interests of the people of Wyoming and our nation, and I will work with partners in Washington to push for their consideration.”

Cheney touted 21 co-sponsors for the Safeguarding Oil and Gas Leasing and Permitting Act and 14 for the Safeguarding Coal Leasing Act, as well as support from a number of industry groups.

“The Petroleum Association of Wyoming applauds Congresswoman Cheney’s common-sense bill that will give voice to those elected offices with a constitutional responsibility to represent the people and lands affected by these misguided attempts to wreak havoc on economies across the West,” said Petroleum Association of Wyoming President Pete Obermueller.

The introduction of the bills follows President Biden’s signing of executive orders laying out an array of climate goals, including conserving 30 percent of public lands and waters by 2030, halting the granting of leases on public lands or offshore waters and putting the U.S. on a path to reaching net-zero emissions by 2050.

The move by Cheney could play well among her constituents in Wyoming, which is a major producer of coal, natural gas and crude oil, but could also serve as a way to tap into a popular issue within the GOP at a time when she faces withering criticism from conservatives over her vote this month to impeach former President Trump.

Cheney has cast her vote as one of “conscience” after Trump egged on a raucous crowd of supporters who later waged a violent riot in the Capitol on Jan. 6, an event that led to the deaths of several people.

Cheney's vote outraged some House Republicans and sparked a petition by some to remove her from her leadership post.

Days after the impeachment vote, Cheney got her first official GOP primary challenger for the 2022 election.

Regulator shelves rule meant to force banks to serve oil, gun companies

BY SYLVAN LANE - 01/28/21 10:25 AM EST

• Cheney offers bill to prohibit suspension of oil, gas, coal leases

The OCC on Jan. 14 finalized its Fair Access rule, which was proposed in November to protect oil, natural gas and firearms companies from being spurned by banks. A slew of major banks have backed away from financing oil and gas drilling projects and firearm manufacturers in recent years, citing climate change and several mass shootings.

Republicans applauded the OCC for taking action to protect such companies, some comparing their woes to the centuries of financial discrimination faced by people of color in the U.S.

Democrats and advocates for big banks — two groups rarely on the same page — condemned the proposal as unnecessary, intrusive and shortsighted.

PUBLIC OWNERSHIP OF BIG PHARMA

Belgian authorities inspect AstraZeneca pharmacies amid EU vaccine dispute

BY CELINE CASTRONUOVO - 01/28/21


© Getty Images


Belgian health authorities on Thursday said they inspected an AstraZeneca pharmaceutical factory upon request from the European Commission, the latest development in the ongoing feud over delays in the delivery of coronavirus vaccines.

According to The Associated Press, the Belgian government was asked to inspect the factory to determine whether the delays in the delivery of AstraZeneca’s vaccine are actually a result of production issues at its manufacturing plants in Europe, as the company has claimed.

The chemical manufacturer Novasep has a factory in the Belgian town of Seneffe that has reportedly been used in the production of AstraZeneca's coronavirus vaccine, which was developed in coordination with Oxford University.

The inspections come as EU officials face pressure to accelerate its vaccine rollout to keep up with other countries like the U.K. and Israel, which have been able to distribute the vaccine at much higher rates.

AstraZeneca agreed to initially give the EU 80 million doses of the coronavirus vaccine, but cut it back to 31 million doses, citing reduced yields from its European manufacturing plants.

The EU on Wednesday claimed that it received even less than that amount and just one quarter of the doses originally agreed upon for the bloc’s 27 member states from January to March.

AstraZeneca on Wednesday denied the claim that it was failing to honor its commitments to the EU, with AstraZeneca Chief Executive Pascal Soriot saying, “Our contract is not a contractual commitment, it’s a best effort.”

“Basically, we said we’re going to try our best, but we can’t guarantee we’re going to succeed. In fact, getting there, we are a little bit delayed,” Soriot added.

The AP reported that the EU has committed to buying a total of 300 million AstraZeneca doses with the possibility of 100 million extra shots.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on Tuesday gave a warning to pharmaceutical companies that developed coronavirus vaccines with the help of EU aid, saying at the World Economic Forum’s virtual event in Switzerland that the companies “must deliver” and “honor their obligations.”

According to the AP, the EU invested about 2.7 billion euros, roughly $3.3 billion, in companies researching and developing COVID-19 vaccines.

EU, AstraZeneca feud escalates over delays in vaccine delivery

Despite the ongoing dispute with AstraZeneca, Stefan de Keersmaecker, the European Commission’s health policy spokesman, said that authorities believe they will still be able to meet their goal of vaccinating at least 80 percent of EU citizens over the age of 80 by March.

“It is an ambitious target, but we believe it is a realistic one,” he said, according to the AP, noting the readiness of doses provided by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna.

The Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines are currently the only coronavirus inoculations to be approved for use in the EU, though AstraZeneca is expected to be reviewed by regulators on Friday.

PUBLIC OWNERSHIP OF BIG PHARMA

Experts Say We Must End Big Pharma Monopoly on COVID Vaccine Supply and Price

As rich countries race to roll out their vaccination programs, leaders in the Global South and global health advocates are increasingly decrying vaccine hoarding that has pushed poorer countries to the back of the line during the pandemic. Some rich countries have secured enough COVID-19 vaccines to inoculate their populations several times over, while poorer countries struggle to secure enough doses, almost certainly prolonging the pandemic by months or even years. Public health policy expert Dr. Mohga Kamal-Yanni says an obvious way to address the issue is to share technology so more companies in more countries can produce the vaccines. “There is a supply issue,” she says. “We’re in a pandemic. We need to vaccinate a big percentage of the population globally if we want to be safe.”

TRANSCRIPT (VIDEO BELOW)

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now! I’m Amy Goodman, with Nermeen Shaikh.

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa is urging wealthy countries to stop hoarding surplus doses of COVID-19 vaccines. He made the comments in an address to leaders at the World Economic Forum.

PRESIDENT CYRIL RAMAPHOSA: The rich countries of the world went out and acquired large doses of vaccines from the developers and manufacturers of these vaccines. And some countries have even gone beyond and acquired up to four times what their population needs. And that was aimed at hoarding these vaccines. And now this is being done to the exclusion of countries, of other countries in the world, that most need this. … We are all not safe if some countries are vaccinating their people and other countries are not vaccinating. We all must act together in combating coronavirus, because it affects all of us equally.

AMY GOODMAN: That’s South African President Cyril Ramaphosa. His comments come as the death toll from COVID tops 42,000 in South Africa, about half of the entire African continent.

To talk more about vaccine equity, we’re joined by Dr. Mohga Kamal-Yanni. She is a policy adviser to the People’s Vaccine Alliance and to UNAIDS, the joint U.N. program on HIV and AIDS. She has worked for decades on access to medicines and healthcare in developing countries, previously senior health and HIV policy adviser at Oxfam, the global anti-poverty organization, speaking to us from Oxford in Great Britain.

Thanks so much for joining us again. I wanted to ask you about — you just listened to Dr. Hotez, the problems the U.S. is having in distributing the vaccine. You listen with an ear of, whatever problems we’re having in the U.S., if only, kind of — the idea that of the 46 countries that are vaccinating their populations, only one is a low-income country. What can be done about this?

DR. MOHGA KAMAL–YANNI: Well, the thing is, what people forget is the problem we’re having, or one of the big problems, is the supply. There isn’t enough doses available now, or tomorrow or next week, for everybody. Even if you want to vaccinate everybody in the U.S., as your plan is, you know, Biden’s plan — and same in the U.K. — where are you going to get the doses? So, there is a supply issue.

You know, the EU now is having a fight with AstraZeneca, because AstraZeneca didn’t — cut down on what they will be able to supply for the time being. Now, why? Because there isn’t enough doses. Why there isn’t enough doses? Because we’re keeping the production tied to one company. You know, only AstraZeneca can produce the Oxford vaccine. Only Pfizer can produce the BioNTech vaccine. And only Moderna can produce the vaccine that was developed by the NIH, or jointly with the NIH. This is just — it’s really crazy. We’re in a pandemic. We need to vaccinate a big percentage of the population globally, if we want to be safe.

So, there is a solution. The solution is to share technology. And WHO set up a mechanism whereby you can share that technology. The companies can share the technology with this mechanism. It’s called COVID Technology Access Pool — C-TAP, for short. So, C-TAP can facilitate the technology transfer from the company to the potential producers, whether these producers are in India or in Indonesia or in Jordan or in South Africa or in Italy or Spain or any other country. There is more manufacture capacity in the world, totally unused. Why? Because we still want to keep, or leaders want to keep, the monopoly on supply and on price in the hands of pharmaceutical companies. This is crazy in a pandemic. I mean, it’s bad in normal time. In a pandemic, it’s just crazy.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: Well, Dr. Kamal-Yanni, as you’ve said, there is a massive shortage, for these reasons, of vaccines. And of the vaccines that are available, as of earlier this month, mid-January, a small group of rich countries, comprising just 16% of the world’s population, had already bought up 60% —

DR. MOHGA KAMAL–YANNI: Yeah.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: — of the world’s supply. Now, it’s clear at this point that most low- and even middle-income countries will not get access this year, and possibly next year, to either the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine, although some may get the AstraZeneca vaccine. A number of countries now have been making bilateral deals with China —

DR. MOHGA KAMAL–YANNI: Yeah.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: — which has two vaccines that have been approved at least in China, as well as with Russia for their Sputnik V vaccine. And in China, it’s Sinopharm and Sinovac. What do we know about the effectiveness of these vaccines and the likelihood that they will help, their production and dissemination in poorer countries will help arrest the pandemic?

DR. MOHGA KAMAL–YANNI: Well, so, the countries kind of realize that they can’t wait, and that they’re going to the big companies. They get the reply of “Sorry. You know, all my production for this year is booked.” They got that answer, actually, from a number of companies. So they had to go to the Chinese and to the Russians.

Now, the Chinese companies, the two that you mentioned — and there’s others in the pipeline — the two that you mentioned are using kind of old, tested technology. So, they have the great potential of being easy to make, or easier to make, and they can produce at massive scale. So, they have that potential.

The problem is that we don’t have the data on the efficacy and the safety of these vaccines. Sinopharm was approved in the Emirates, and the Emirates regulatory authority said it, I think, is over 80% effectiveness. In Brazil, the clinical trial said it’s 54%. We don’t know the details of why is this, so it’s difficult to really judge. It’s difficult for a country that is buying this vaccine to judge the efficacy and the safety and the quality of the vaccine.

But, however, the good news is that both vaccines have submitted data to the WHO to look at the efficacy, safety and quality, and hopefully WHO can get this information, can get all the information they need, and therefore can tell us that these vaccines are good, because if they say these vaccines are good, then that is really good news for developing countries. They would not have to wait for Pfizer or Moderna.

The Russian vaccine, I think WHO is still waiting for data on the Russian vaccine, to explore it, to investigate it. But I think they haven’t — well, they’re still waiting for the data, so we don’t really know what will happen.

But again, you know, there is capacity in the world. We go round and round trying to find a solution, when the solution is kind of in our face, and the countries don’t want to look at it. So, if you have technology transfer, sharing technology — so, China can share. Cuba has just — is in Phase III trial in one of its vaccines, and Cuba has 30 years’ experience of manufacturing vaccines for its people. So, you know, there are these capacities. Indians are also researching vaccines, on top of the bilateral deal that they have with — that one company has with AstraZeneca. So, there is that capacity. Can you imagine when everybody — Italy has capacity. When everybody that has capacity can produce the vaccines, can you imagine how many millions of doses we will have for developing countries and even for rich countries?

AMY GOODMAN: We want to thank you so much for being with us, and we hope to have you back soon. This is a continuing issue in this crisis of the globe. Dr. Mohga Kamal-Yanni, policy adviser to the People’s Vaccine Alliance and to UNAIDS, the joint U.N. program on HIV and AIDS, has worked for decades on access to medicines and healthcare in developing countries.

This is Democracy Now! When we come back, who is Enrique Tarrio? The leader of the Proud Boys, a “prolific” government informant. Stay with us.

Biden’s Private Prison Executive Order Doesn’t Undo Mass Incarceration

Vice President Kamala Harris looks on as President Joe Biden signs executive orders related to his racial equity agenda in the State Dining Room of the White House on January 26, 2021, in Washington, D.C.DOUG MILLS-POOL / GETTY IMAGES

BY Lydia Pelot-Hobbs, Truthout PUBLISHED January 27, 2021

On January 26, 2021, President Joe Biden signed a series of executive orders in the name of advancing racial equity. One of the most high-profile orders resurrected an Obama-era policy to phase out the Department of Justice’s contracts with privately managed prisons. As a politician whose career has been marked by championing federal law and order policies, including but not limited to the 1994 Crime Bill, Biden has been challenged by anti-prison activists and advocates to account for his past actions and to use his executive powers to reduce the scope and power of the federal penal system. Although couched in the language of taking on mass incarceration, Biden’s private prison executive order fails to scale back incarceration or to confront racial state violence head–on.

As has been widely noted, privately managed prisons are not the propellers of mass incarceration but as abolitionist scholar Ruth Wilson Gilmore explains, they serve as “parasites” on the system. Private prison companies showed up decades into the U.S.’s process of prison expansion and have always been a small slice of the U.S. prison system. And it has been public dollars and public laws that allow for privately run prisons to exist. The problem of private prisons is not that they are private but that they are prisons.

Biden’s executive order impacts a small segment of the current carceral state. His order not only applies exclusively to the federal Bureau of Prisons — which makes up slightly more than 8 percent of the current U.S. penal population — but just 9 percent of the people incarcerated under the Bureau of Prisons are held in a private prison. Rather than addressing the whole of the Bureau of Prisons under his purview, Biden’s order covers only 11 prisons, which incarcerate a total of 14,000 people.

In addition, immigration justice activists have rightfully called attention to Biden’s exclusion of the Department of Homeland Security, and therefore privately run immigration detention centers, from his order. In contrast to the small percentage of private prisons within the Bureau of Prisons, the majority of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention facilities are currently under private contracts. Yet there is no indication that the Biden administration will extend the executive order to the Department of Homeland Security, as the order is careful to only refer to “criminal” detention facilities in contrast to ICE’s “civil” detention facilities.

What’s more, such executive commitments have proven less than secure. Under Obama, after the Department of Justice pledged it would not renew such contracts unless they were substantially reduced in scope, the Department of Justice renewed two separate private prison contracts at close to the previous capacity agreements. Furthermore, following the election of Donald Trump, Obama’s executive order was thrown in the trash allowing for a host of other federal private prison contracts to be renewed.

Yet, even if ICE detention facilities were included and the order was air-tight, the fact remains that Biden’s executive order does nothing to reduce punitive power. Under this policy, not a single person will be released any earlier from jail or prison and the feds will not cut back on policing and prosecution. This executive order is simply an act of moving chairs around the deck of the Titanic. When a private prison contract runs out, imprisoned people will be transferred to a different federal prison where they will still be subject to inadequate medical care, sexualized state violence and concentrated premature death. While Biden contends that public prisons are more “safe and humane,” the problems that plague private prisons are mirrored in their public counterparts. As the pandemic has starkly demonstrated, no prison is a site of health or well-being.Rather than taking a step toward dismantling mass incarceration, Biden’s private prison executive order shores up the legitimacy of the state to imprison people.

Furthermore, Biden makes clear that this policy is grounded in the idea that people in prison deserve and need to be incarcerated. As his executive order states, “We must ensure that our Nation’s incarceration and correctional systems are prioritizing rehabilitation and redemption…. However, privately operated criminal detention facilities consistently underperform Federal facilities with respect to correctional services, programs, and resources. We should ensure that time in prison prepares individuals for the next chapter of their lives.” Under this punitive framework, Biden locates the root of mass incarceration in individuals who need to be fixed rather than in white supremacy, capitalism, and the state’s widening net of criminalization and control.

Rather than taking a step toward dismantling mass incarceration, Biden’s private prison executive order shores up the legitimacy of the state to imprison people.

While it might be tempting to frame President Biden’s actions as a well-intentioned, if misguided, step toward ending mass incarceration, we must remember that as an architect of the U.S. prison boom, Biden is more than knowledgeable about the true levers of mass criminalization. Having spent his years as a senator drafting legislation that expanded police power, increased federal penalties, and financed public prison and jail expansion, it would be disingenuous to act as if he doesn’t know any better.

If Biden were serious about undoing carceral power, there are many things he could do. He could issue a moratorium on U.S. Marshals Service and ICE contracts with local jails and on the United States Department of Agriculture loan program, which finances jail expansion in the name of “community development,” and which together have been driving rural jail expansions at a breakneck pace. He could halt federal executions and commute the sentence of every person on federal death row. Biden could institute broad-based decarceration by ending pre-trial federal detention and giving clemency to most or all people incarcerated in federal prisons. He could push to defund and dismantle the Department of Homeland Security and Bureau of Prisons. He could end federal policing initiatives that target sex workers. And he could champion the repeal of the 1994 Crime Bill.

There are many avenues for Biden to take on mass incarceration. Targeting private prisons is not one of them.

As Biden Issues Groundbreaking Climate Orders, Activists Push to Ban Fracking

On Wednesday, the Biden administration delivered a second surge of orders responding to activist demands to address the climate emergency head-on at every level of the federal government. Like no mandate a U.S. president has signed off on before, the Executive Order on Tackling the Climate Crisis at Home and Abroad lays out a plan to measure and mitigate pollution that has disproportionately harmed low-income, Black, Indigenous and other communities of color living on the fence lines of industry for decades. It is a government-wide attempt to avert the most catastrophic impacts of the climate crisis and build a more vibrant and equitable society that acknowledges the legacy of harm over a century of burning fossil fuels and overlooking industry has caused communities of color and other vulnerable communities that are now the most prone to the floods, fires, disease and displacement of climate chaos.

The directive establishes the first-ever National Climate Task Force and a jobs program committed to spurring clean energy jobs in communities historically employed by the coal, oil and gas industries. In this way it aims to counteract negative effects on employment caused by the winding down of the entire fossil fuel sector, which scientists and activists have named as the most essential task in limiting warming to 1.5°C or lower. Biden’s order pulls from the visions of community organizers, mentioning plans to remediate former brownfields (previously developed and often contaminated lands that are not currently in use) and turn them into clean energy hubs. It also seeks to restore coastal ecosystems like oyster reefs, mangroves and kelp forests that buffer the built environment from extreme weather and rising seas. In following the directive to “listen to science and meet the moment,” the commitment sets out to channel 40 percent of the benefits of federal investments in clean energy, transit, housing and clean water infrastructure, among other overhauls, to marginalized communities specifically.

“It’s almost as if we helped shape the platform,” New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez joked, echoing a momentary sigh of relief on the part of progressive organizers for whom the announcement signals they may see some demands for racial and environmental justice realized after a grueling season of campaigning for Democrats, who now control the White House and both houses of Congress. In combination with Biden’s initial actions last week, including canceling the Keystone XL pipeline and rejoining the Paris agreement, the Biden administration’s climate orders address at least some elements in 15 of the 25 orders put forward in an action blueprint advocated by the coalition of progressive organizations, Build Back Fossil Free.

“Many of the things we have been fighting for became a reality,” the Sunrise Movement posted on Twitter, listing Biden’s newly stated commitment to launching a Civilian Climate Corps Initiative modeled after the Civilian Conservation Corps of the New Deal and a directive to the secretary of agriculture to work with farmers and ranchers to create new sources of wealth. Those sources include rebuilding healthy soils depleted by expensive and ecologically devastating industrial agriculture practices and storing carbon in the process.

Whether Biden’s full $2 trillion climate plan can be realized largely depends on abolishing the filibuster, as Grist has reported. In the meantime, activists will be watching for Biden to deliver on executive promises he can make with the stroke of a pen. “We need Biden to take action on this entire platform, not just pieces of it,” Erika Thi Patterson, environment campaign director for the Action Center on Race and the Economy, told Truthout. “It’s time to cease allowing corporations from treating our communities as sacrifice zones for profit.”

Biden’s plans were also met with a solemn recognition that many lives have already been lost to environmental injustice. During a panel discussion following the day’s announcements on the social media app Clubhouse, president and founder of Hip Hop Caucus, Rev. Lennox Yearwood, took a moment to honor family members and friends whose lives were cut short by the kind of pollution the new climate plan is intended to stop. “There are many of us who should have seen and did not get to see this day … who have literally died in this battle,” he said, mentioning the impact of freeways the National Highway Program has sited through the heart of Black communities — children who developed lifelong asthma and family cancer clusters linked to legacy pollution. Yearwood specifically honored his friend, the former deputy director of WE ACT for Environmental Justice, Harlem resident and organizer Cecil Corbin-Mark, who passed away in October 2020 after suffering from a stroke.

“So this is more than an executive order, this is a moment when we see … those who have profited from the fossil fuel industry literally being overturned,” Yearwood said. The executive order takes steps to end federal subsidy payments to fossil fuel companies in the budget for the upcoming Fiscal Year 2022. It also refers to the need to hold polluters accountable but falls short of developing a mechanism or process for doing so.

The historic announcement also raised some confusion and red flags, particularly with regard to the moratorium on new oil and gas leasing on federal land. Alice Madden is the executive director of Getches-Wilkinson Center for Natural Resources, Energy, and the Environment at the University of Colorado Law School. She says in spite of fossil fuel dependent states’ outcry in response to the suspension of new drilling, in reality only 25 percent of all oil production and 12 percent of gas drilling takes place on land the government controls. “Most of where the industry works isn’t even on federal land,” she said, which leaves a massive amount of fossil fuel operations untouched by the order. “For the industry to say ‘this is going to end humanity as we know’ is false, and they know it’s false.”

Thomas Meyer, national organizing manager for Food and Water Watch told Truthout that the Biden administration’s renewed commitment to science through an additional executive order that establishes an advisory council on science and technology is at odds with the administration’s decision not to ban fracking outright, as activist groups have pushed for the administration to do in its first 10 days. According to Meyer, an estimated 1,200 peer-reviewed studies demonstrate a link between fracking and human and environmental health impacts. “It pollutes drinking water, it pollutes air quality and it makes climate change worse every day,” Meyer said. “So to have [Biden] say in one breath ‘we’re going to listen to science’ and then to say ‘we are not banning fracking’ is really just unacceptable,” he said. “You can’t have it both ways.”

Julia Bernal, a Sandia Pueblo member and organizer for the Pueblo Action Alliance, says she’s worried about how the executive order parrots a Clinton-era order loosely committing the federal government to “consult” and “coordinate” with tribal officials. Instead, Indigenous groups want Biden’s administration to commit to a formal consent process, she said, as a sovereign nation. “We’ve seen the loopholes and the gaps and the overall disrespect for tribal sovereignty under executive orders that only talk about tribal consultation,” she said, a change which will be necessary to ensure build outs of future solar fields and wind farms are not corporate endeavors that further displace Indigenous communities. “Consultation hasn’t been working,” Bernal said.

At a Build Back Fossil Free rally ahead of Biden’s big climate announcement, member of the Mdewakanton Dakota and Diné nations and Keep It In the Ground campaign organizer for the Indigenous Environmental Network, Dallas Goldtooth, also called attention to the need to ramp up pressure on Biden to reject all fossil fuel projects, including, most urgently, the Line 3 and Dakota Access pipelines, the latter of which is now operating illegally without a permit, after a federal appeals court upheld a district judge’s order for a full environmental review on Tuesday. “We are done with playing the game of whack-a-mole where we are fighting one project and winning on that project meanwhile three other projects get approved,” he said. “We’re tired of this middle ground approach to addressing climate change when our communities are on the lines.”

Iñupiaq activist Siqiniq Maupin also spoke at the rally. Maupin, whose family is from Nuiqsut, Alaska, described her village as “500 people engulfed in oil and gas.” The town, which is located on the Nechelik Channel and is typically only accessible by an ice road during the winter, is now cloaked in a constant yellow haze, Maupin said, and dotted with gas flares associated with oil and gas production. The number of people being treated for respiratory illnesses in Nuiqsut rose from one to 75 over a period when the fossil fuel industry accelerated leasing from 1986 to 2000. Recent studies show sea ice levels melting in line with the worst-case climate scenarios. The caribou have begun to develop blackened bone marrow, and the fish contain mold, Maupin continued.

“We do not know what our future holds right now. But we do know that any further fossil fuel extraction will only further perpetuate this,” Maupin said, inviting the new president to come visit her community as his administration considers the need for a permanent, economy-wide ban on fossil fuel production, which climate scientists are hopeful could end global warming relatively quickly once emissions hit zero. “Biden needs to come personally and see what’s happening.”