Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) called for President Joe Biden to stop withdrawing oil from the United States’s petroleum reserve, and instead “use our own God-given natural resources.”
Johnson’s comment comes after the Biden administration announced Tuesday that it would release a total of 1 million barrels of gas from storage sites in the Northeast. The price of gas has been a subject of criticism for many voters against the Biden administration, with many calling the cost of living one of the biggest issues ahead of the 2024 presidential election, in which Biden is seeking reelection.
“Use our own God-given natural resources and stop this massive deficit spending,” Johnson said on Fox News’s Sunday Morning Futures with Maria Bartiromo. “There have been studies that show an average American family is spending more than $1,000 per month just to maintain their standard of living because of Biden’s inflation. I’ve seen surveys, anywhere from a third to two-thirds of Americans can’t afford a $400 emergency. They don’t have that much savings. How can they possibly afford $1,000 a month? They can’t.”
The Wisconsin senator concluded that he hopes voters “connect the dots” and vote the Biden administration “out of office.” It is likely the 2024 presidential election will be a rematch between Biden and former President Donald Trump.
In the summer of 2022, when gas prices reached an all-time high of $5.01 per gallon, Biden ordered the sale of 180 million barrels of oil from the U.S. emergency stockpile, which was ordered a few months after the war in Ukraine started. The price of gasoline decreased, though the order did drain the U.S.’s stockpile of gasoline to its lowest level in 40 years.
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Currently, the national average price of gasoline, per AAA, sits at $3.59 per gallon, slightly down from last month’s average of $3.66, though slightly higher than the average last year at $3.57 per gallon.
The economy is expected to be a major motivator for voters ahead of the November elections, with 73% of all voters in a poll ranking the cost of living and inflation as one of their top three issues. 60% of voters in the poll also said they disapprove of Biden’s economy.