U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright expanded on President Donald Trump&#8217;s plan to control Venezuelan oil on Wednesday, saying the United States would soon begin selling Venezuelan crude &#8220;into the marketplace&#8221; and use the sales as &#8220;leverage&#8221; to push the Venezuelan government toward lasting &#8220;change.&#8221;
Wright addressed the situation in Venezuela at the annual Goldman Sachs energy conference in Miami, saying the Trump administration&#8217;s goal is to get Venezuelan crude &#8220;moving again and sell it.&#8221; The U.S.-controlled oil would be sold to buyers in the United States and around the world, with the revenue &#8220;deposited into accounts controlled by the U.S.,&#8221; according to Wright.
&#8220;If we control the flow of oil, the sales of that oil, and the flow of the cash that comes from those sales, we have large leverage,&#8221; he said. &#8220;But without large leverage &#8230; you don&#8217;t get change.&#8221;
&#8220;This should be a wealthy, prosperous, peaceful energy powerhouse,&#8221; Wright said of Venezuela. &#8220;That&#8217;s the plan.&#8221;
President Donald Trump <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trump-says-venezuela-will-turn-over-30-50-million-barrels-of-oil-to-u-s">said</a> on Tuesday that Venezuela would turn over 30 to 50 million barrels of oil to the United States following the U.S. strikes on the country and the capture of Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro.
“This Oil will be sold at its Market Price, and that money will be controlled by me, as President of the United States of America, to ensure it is used to benefit the people of Venezuela and the United States!” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “I have asked Energy Secretary Chris Wright to execute this plan, immediately.”
Wright, a former oil and gas CEO, said Wednesday that Venezuela&#8217;s oil infrastructure is in poor condition, adding that he&#8217;s been speaking to the leaders of energy companies about how it could be improved.
&#8220;The history is bad, but what are the necessary conditions it would take you to kind of help nudge things along?&#8221; Wright said he asked of the energy companies. &#8220;What are the necessary conditions it would take you to put billions of dollars in to develop fields and build infrastructure?&#8221;
The United States continues enforcing a naval blockade around Venezuela, blocking sanctioned tankers from transporting oil to other countries. Earlier on Wednesday, U.S. forces seized a Russian-flagged oil tanker that had evaded the blockade after being linked to Venezuelan oil shipments, officials said.
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/live-updates-united-states-strikes-venezuela-captures-president-maduro?topStoryPosition=undefined&amp;author=Daily+Wire&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=0&amp;row=1&amp;rowHeadline=Top+Stories&amp;rowType=Top+Stories&amp;title=LIVE+UPDATES%3A+U.S.+Military+Seizes+Sanctioned+Oil+Tanker+Sailing+Under+Russian+Flag">LIVE UPDATES: U.S. Military Seizes Sanctioned Oil Tanker Sailing Under Russian Flag</a>
Venezuela&#8217;s oil production dropped significantly after the country was taken over by socialist dictators. At its peak in the 1970s, Venezuela produced about 3.5 million barrels per day, but as of last year, it had plunged to roughly 1.1 million barrels per day, Reuters <a href="https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/us-wants-venezuelan-oil-flowing-again-with-revenues-us-accounts-wright-says-2026-01-07/">reported</a>.
&#8220;We could get several hundred thousand barrels a day of additional production in short to medium term if the conditions are there for just small capital deployments,&#8221; Wright said. He added that it will &#8220;take tens of billions of dollars and significant time&#8221; for the United States to return Venezuela to its &#8220;historical numbers&#8221; of crude output, but said it would be worth the effort.
&#8220;Don&#8217;t we want a better world? A better world for Americans, a better world for Western Hemisphere, a better world for Venezuelans?&#8221; he asked.

Chris Wright

U.S. To Control Venezuelan Oil Sales As ‘Leverage’ For ‘Change,’ Energy Secretary Says

U.S. To Control Venezuelan Oil Sales As 'Leverage' For 'Change,' Energy Secretary Says

Department of Energy

Donald Trump

Nicolas Maduro

Trump Administration

U.S.

Venezuela

Last month, President Donald Trump and Energy Secretary Chris Wright’s Climate Working Group completed its work, and quietly achieved something few expected: they reset the national conversation on climate policy.
For years, Washington’s climate agenda has been dominated by alarmism, junk science, and a revolving cast of “experts” whose warnings are backed not by empirical evidence but the billions of dollars flowing from dark money climate advocacy groups and left-wing billionaires more focused on concentrating power than global temperatures.
The federal government has relied heavily on so-called “climate attribution” studies, which claim to link every hurricane, wildfire, and heatwave to carbon emissions.
These studies are widely criticized, even within the scientific community, for flawed methodology and confirmation bias. Yet policymakers have treated them as gospel, driving expensive and economically damaging regulations. Craven politicians have used them to attempt to condition the American people to believe every storm is the result of energy producers, and the only answer is multi-trillion-dollar energy transitions.
The Climate Working Group ripped that narrative apart. Its report exposed the flimsy assumptions, the overreliance on discredited models, and the tendency to inflate worst-case scenarios while ignoring economic realities. The group didn’t simply question climate orthodoxy; it demanded that science, logic, and reality guide policy — rather than ideology and grant-driven research agendas.
<a class="c-link" href="https://get.dailywire.com/subscribe/plus/?utm_campaign=fall40&amp;utm_content=fallsale&amp;utm_medium=website&amp;utm_source=editorial" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-stringify-link="https://get.dailywire.com/subscribe/plus/?utm_campaign=fall40&amp;utm_content=fallsale&amp;utm_medium=website&amp;utm_source=editorial" data-sk="tooltip_parent">Get 40% off new DailyWire+ annual memberships with code FALL40 at checkout!</a>
Predictably, the backlash was immediate and loud. Dark-money-funded climate groups with questionable credibility, like the Union of Concerned Scientists and the Environmental Defense Fund, and self-styled “scientists” who have been discredited within peer-reviewed circles, launched predictable attacks, dismissing the report as reckless or even dangerous. They sued to prevent the report from even seeing the light of day.
The rapid, even frantic mobilization to shut this report down told us everything we need to know.
Because this report poked holes and raised questions about the “climate consensus,” it served as an existential threat to an entire constellation of dark money interests, NGO’s, political candidates and groups, and non-profits that rely on Americans believing that every raindrop and gust of wind they experience is actually the fault of the oil and gas companies.
The truth is simple: the group accomplished exactly what it was supposed to do. It recentered the debate on facts, not fear, and reminded policymakers that exaggerated claims of catastrophe do not replace rigorous analysis. And that those with genuine scientific curiosity should not kowtow to a politically driven “consensus” that shuts down questions and intellectual challenge.
Events at Climate Week in New York highlighted just how important this shift has been. Secretary Wright joined David Gelles of The New York Times for a <a href="https://youtu.be/XzkZ-a0UMN8?si=NTNKgD4wEYOaSBhe&amp;t=1304" target="_blank" rel="noopener">discussion</a> on Energy in the Trump administration.
Gelles asked questions using the Left’s normal framing about extreme weather and climate change, and Secretary Wright pushed back forcefully, saying, “These crazy convoluted links &#8230; making weather more extreme, more hurricanes, more intense hurricanes. That’s not what’s in the IPCC reports, it’s not what’s in the data. It’s what the media says, it’s what activists say, it’s what politicians say. It’s not in the data.”
Gelles pushed back: “There’s a ton of attribution science, though. Are you saying that the studies that are showing attribution science that do the actual scientific work to link global temperature rise to specific weather events are not to be trusted?”
“Attribution science is not science,” Wright responded. “You can’t draw a long-term slow trend to a weather event, tornadoes, hurricanes, extremely complicated phenomena. Attribution science is someone reaching for something.”
Thanks to the Climate Working Group, discussions about climate policy can no longer ignore economic costs, energy realities, or the limits of current science. For the first time in years, the debate has been pulled back from ideological extremes and into the light of scrutiny.
Mission accomplished. And if the critics are howling, that’s just proof the Working Group hit the mark.
The Honorable Jason Isaac is the Founder and CEO of the American Energy Institute, a trade organization that unapologetically champions free markets and American energy. Previously, he served four terms in the Texas House of Representatives.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

How The Trump Administration Changed The Climate Conversation

Climate Change

Oklo, an advanced nuclear technology company, announced on Thursday plans to build a “first-of-its-kind” nuclear fuel recycling center.
The first phase of the project is expected to cost nearly $1.7 billion and create 800 jobs. The facility, to be built in Tennessee, will be the first privately-funded nuclear fuel recycling center.
“Fuel is the single most important factor in bringing advanced nuclear energy to market,” Oklo co-founder and CEO Jacob DeWitte said in a statement. “By recycling used nuclear fuel at an industrial scale, we are turning waste into watts, cutting costs, and establishing a secure U.S. supply chain that will accelerate deployment of clean, reliable, and affordable power. Tennessee is showing the nation that recycling can be done commercially.”
Energy Secretary Chris Wright served on Oklo’s board of directors before being nominated to head the Department of Energy in the Trump administration.
The facility to be built will recycle used nuclear fuel, offering a potential solution to a divisive issue that has plagued the nuclear energy industry: how to dispose of spent fuel. Answers to the question have proven difficult, such as in the case of the <a href="https://19january2021snapshot.epa.gov/radiation/what-yucca-mountain-repository_.html">proposed</a> Yucca Mountain repository that has drawn strong opposition from local and state leaders in Nevada.
“The recycling facility will recover energy-bearing materials from used nuclear fuel to be fabricated into metallic fuel for fast reactors. Once used in a reactor, this process significantly reduces waste volumes for more economical, clean, and efficient disposal pathways,” the Oklo press release says.
The “metallic fuel” can be used the power fast reactors such as Oklo’s Aurora powerhouse, a zero-emission power plant that “only needs to be refueled once every decade (or longer),” according to <a href="https://oklo.com/energy/default.aspx">Oklo</a>. Maintenance on Aurora will take place more often, however.
&#8220;Everyone who wants American energy to be cleaner, more affordable, and more sustainable should be rejoicing today. Oklo&#8217;s program to turn Cold War-era plutonium into safe nuclear fuel for today — and tomorrow — is a bold and exciting achievement,” Jason Isaac, CEO of the American Energy Institute, told The Daily Wire in a statement.
Oklo and the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) are looking at more opportunities to collaborate, such as Oklo handling nuclear fuel recycling for the TVA and building other facilities in the state.
Energy and Environment Legal Institute senior policy fellow Steve Milloy, who worked on the 2016 Trump transition team, credited President Donald Trump with the project’s success. Trump signed an <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/05/deploying-advanced-nuclear-reactor-technologies-for-national-security/">executive order</a> in May encouraging “the rapid development, deployment, and use of advanced nuclear technologies to support national security objectives.”
“President Trump’s leadership is the reason this breakthrough is happening. It’s telling that, even in the face of historic progress, anti-nuclear activists would rather tear down solutions than acknowledge success. This project offers the American people exactly what they deserve: affordable, reliable, and clean energy,” Milloy told The Daily Wire in a statement.

Jacob DeWitte

Red State To House ‘First-Of-Its-Kind’ Recycling Center For Used Nuclear Fuel

Energy

Nuclear Power

Tennessee

The Trump administration plans to make available about 20 metric tons of Cold War-era plutonium from dismantled nuclear warheads to U.S. power companies as a potential fuel for reactors, according to a source familiar with the matter and a draft memo outlining the plan.
Plutonium has previously only been converted to fuel for commercial U.S. reactors in short-lived tests. The plan would follow through on an executive order signed by President Donald Trump in May ordering the government to halt much of its existing program to dilute and dispose of surplus plutonium, and instead provide it as a fuel for advanced nuclear technologies.
The Department of Energy, or DOE, plans to announce in coming days it will seek proposals from industry, said the source who spoke on the condition of anonymity. The source cautioned that because the plan is still a draft, its final details could change pending further discussions.
The plutonium would be offered to industry at little to no cost &#8212; with a catch. Industry will be responsible for costs of transportation, designing, building, and decommissioning DOE-authorized facilities to recycle, process and manufacture the fuel, the memo said.
The details on the volume of the plutonium, industry&#8217;s responsibilities in the plan and the potential timing of a U.S. announcement, have not been previously reported. The 20 metric tons would be drawn from a larger, 34-metric-ton stockpile of weapons-grade plutonium that the United States had previously committed to dispose of under a non-proliferation agreement with Russia in 2000.
The Department of Energy did not confirm or deny the Reuters reporting, saying only that the department is &#8220;evaluating a variety of strategies to build and strengthen domestic supply chains for nuclear fuel, including plutonium,&#8221; as directed by Trump&#8217;s orders.
<a href="https://get.dailywire.com/subscribe/plus/?utm_campaign=summer&amp;utm_content=editorialsummersale&amp;utm_medium=website&amp;utm_source=editorial" target="_blank" rel="noopener">End of Summer Sale – Get 40% off New DailyWire+ Annual Memberships</a>
Boosting the U.S. power industry is a policy priority for the Trump administration as U.S. electricity demand rises for the first time in two decades on the boom in data centers needed for artificial intelligence.
The idea of using surplus plutonium for fuel has raised concerns among nuclear safety experts who argue a previous similar effort failed.
Under the 2000 agreement, the plutonium was initially planned to be converted to mixed oxide fuel, or MOX, to run in nuclear power plants. But in 2018, the first Trump administration killed the contract for a MOX project that it said would have cost more than $50 billion.
The U.S. Energy Department holds surplus plutonium at heavily guarded weapons facilities including Savannah River in South Carolina, Pantex in Texas, and Los Alamos in New Mexico. Plutonium has a half-life of 24,000 years and must be handled with protective gear.
Until Trump&#8217;s May order, the U.S. program to dispose of the plutonium has involved blending it with an inert material and storing it in an experimental underground storage site called the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico.
The Energy Department has estimated that burying the plutonium would cost $20 billion.
&#8220;Trying to convert this material into reactor fuel is insanity. It would entail trying to repeat the disastrous MOX fuel program and hoping for a different result,&#8221; said Edwin Lyman, a nuclear physicist at the Union of Concerned Scientists.
&#8220;The excess plutonium is a dangerous waste product and DOE should stick to the safer, more secure and far cheaper plan to dilute and directly dispose of it in WIPP.&#8221;
(Reporting by Timothy Gardner; Editing by Richard Valdmanis and Lisa Shumaker)

Trump Plans To Make Cold War-Era Plutonium Available For Nuclear Power

President Donald Trump&#8217;s energy dominance agenda could raise the United States GDP by up to 1.9% within the next decade, according to a new report.
The White House Council of Economic Advisors released a <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/The-Economic-Benefits-of-Unleashing-American-Energy.pdf">report</a> on the impact of Trump’s energy policies and deregulation on Thursday. Experts estimated that additional energy production alongside deregulatory policies could bolster economic growth in the United States, growing GDP “by at least 0.56-1.90 percent by 2035.”
“Unleashing energy abundance was key to the historic job, wage, economic, and investment growth that President Trump delivered during his first term,” White House spoeksman Kush Desai told The Daily Wire in a statement. “Energy abundance is again key for President Trump’s second term push to cement America’s dominance in AI and restore our industrial base, and the Administration is committed to pulling every stop to power the restoration of American Greatness.”
The report identified a few key weak points in the United States’ current energy production and distribution system, such as long delays for government approvals, aging infrastructure, and supply chains for critical minerals that run through “unreliable or adversarial sources.” But the United States sits upon a wealth of natural resources that contributed to the country being the “world’s leading producer of petroleum, natural gas, and nuclear power” in 2023.
Earlier this month, a Department of Energy report <a href="https://www.energy.gov/articles/department-energy-releases-report-evaluating-us-grid-reliability-and-security">estimated</a> that blackouts across the United States “could increase by 100 times in 2030 if the U.S. continues to shutter reliable power sources and fails to add additional firm capacity.”
The Trump administration wants to accelerate U.S. energy production in part because the country’s budding AI industry uses massive amounts of electricity.
“By some estimates, executing a ChatGPT prompt can be 10 times more energy intensive than a Google search,” the report states.
By 2030, AI data processing centers in the United States will use more electricity than the “production of aluminum, steel, cement, chemicals and all other energy-intensive goods combined,” according to the International Energy Agency.
With AI development could come meaningful increases in production.
“If half of U.S. businesses engage in widespread use of AI by 2034, the annual productivity growth of labor could be 1.5 percentage points higher starting in 2034 than it would otherwise be without widespread AI adoption. This boost in labor productivity could, in turn, increase GDP growth by 0.4 percent in 2034,” the report states.
The surging demand for electricity by AI data centers could lead to price spikes for energy consumers. In order to prevent that, the report states that the United States needs to build out energy production from relatively inexpensive, reliable sources, such as natural gas.
“[C]ombined-cycle natural gas power plants are currently the lowest-cost reliable power generation option in the U.S., with a levelized cost of energy (LCOE) of about $30 per megawatt-hour,” the report states. The price for energy output from natural gas is much lower than renewables, which the report priced at “$45-$55 per MWh” because of the additional cost of building batteries to ensure reliable energy when solar panels and wind turbines are not able to generate electricity.
The Trump administration is also slowing the retirement of nuclear and coal plants to avoid large gaps in electrical production from lost sources. Other plants, such as Michigan’s Palisades nuclear power plant, may be revived and put back into the U.S. electrical grid.
In addition to protecting, reviving, and building energy production, the administration is also working through a slew of deregulatory plans to streamline government approvals and encourage quicker energy development, including reforms to landmark environmental regulations such as the Clean Water Act and Endangered Species Act.

U.S. Economy Will Boom Under Trump’s Energy Dominance Agenda, New Report Shows

Economy

White House

The second Trump administration has made a point of rolling back regulations that restrict the functionality of home appliances in the name of efficiency during its first 100 days.
Energy Secretary Chris Wright laid out what the administration has accomplished on appliance efficiency standards that should result in a better quality of life for consumers during a trip to a Georgia factory that could have been shut down if not for deregulation.
At the Rinnai America Corporation’s manufacturing facility in Griffin, Georgia, they make tankless water heaters, one of the appliances for which the Department of Energy has postponed new, more restrictive standards. Tankless water heaters, of course, are beloved appliances in households across the country where residents have decided they don&#8217;t like running out of hot water for showers.
Wright&#8217;s agency postponed water heater rules on March 24. The rules would have punished companies such as Rinnai, according to the Department of Energy.
“Rinnai is the only company manufacturing non-condensing tankless water heaters in the United States. A Biden-era rule would have effectively banned these products — putting more than 200 Georgia jobs at risk, undermining U.S. manufacturing, and stripping away a cost-effective, high-efficiency option from American households,” a department <a href="https://www.energy.gov/articles/secretary-energy-chris-wright-visit-rinnai-america-griffin-georgia-mark-100-days" target="_blank" rel="noopener">press release</a> said.
On the same day in March that Wright’s department took action on water heater rules, the Energy Department postponed and rescinded rules on a slate of other household appliances, as well. It lifted rules and deadlines on appliances such as walk-in coolers and freezers, central air conditioners and heat pumps, electric motors, ceiling fans, dehumidifiers, and external power supplies.
“Today, Americans are paying less at the pump and have more choices for home appliances thanks to President Trump cutting red tape and unleashing the production of affordable, reliable, secure American energy,” Wright said in a <a href="https://www.energy.gov/articles/secretary-wright-highlights-100-days-unleashing-american-energy-under-president-trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">statement</a> marking Trump’s 100th day in office.
President Donald Trump joked about actions his administration took on showerheads during a rally on Tuesday.
“We&#8217;ve opened up your faucets,” Trump <a href="https://x.com/AutismCapital/status/1917358070298193943" target="_blank" rel="noopener">said</a>. “I don&#8217;t like taking a shower where the water goes drip, drip, drip onto my luxuriant hair. I need a lot of water. I need everything I can get. I don&#8217;t need to be under a shower trying to get water to come out of that damn thing.”
Last month, Trump <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/04/maintaining-acceptable-water-pressure-in-showerheads/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">ordered</a> the repeal of a 13,000-word regulation defining the term “showerhead.” The Energy Department also postponed Biden-era efficiency standards for manufactured housing and began the process to lift efficiency regulations on portable electric spas.

How Trump’s Team Made Home Appliances Great Again In First 100 Days

Here's All The Ways Trump Is Making Appliances Great Again In Just 100 Days

Secretary of Energy Chris Wright will travel to Oak Ridge, Tennessee, on Friday to tour nuclear facilities and take part in a summit on the future of artificial intelligence development in the United States.
Wright’s visit to Oak Ridge, one of the original sites of the Manhattan Project, comes after he spent Monday at New Mexico’s Los Alamos National Lab touring its highly secure supercomputing and plutonium facilities. At Oak Ridge, Wright will tour the site’s supercomputer and Y-12, a facility that produces and stores enriched uranium.
GOP Rep. Chuck Fleischmann of Tennessee, the chairman of the Energy and Water Appropriations subcommittee, will be one of several lawmakers hosting Wright.
“Oak Ridge and East Tennessee are at the forefront of developing groundbreaking new technologies such as AI, revitalizing our defense industrial base, and working to deliver on President Trump’s and Secretary Wright’s agenda to unleash American-made energy by expanding new nuclear power and technologies,” Fleischmann told The Daily Wire, adding that such advancements “are essential to our national security, economic prosperity, and powering our nation through the 21st Century.”
Wright’s visit to the Tennessee nuclear site comes as the administration prioritizes AI research and development to outperform U.S. adversaries like China. Wright will meet with OpenAI’s president and co-founder, Greg Brockman, on Friday and take part in a virtual summit described as a “1,000 Scientist AI Jam Session,” according to an Oak Ridge spokesman.
The summit is a “first-of-its-kind event being co-hosted by OpenAI and nine of the U.S. Department of Energy’s national labs to explore how AI can accelerate scientific discovery,” the spokesman told The Daily Wire. “Participants will have access to leading frontier AI models to test research applications, evaluate model responses, and help improve future AI systems. Secretary Wright and Mr. Brockman will give remarks and visit with participating Oak Ridge scientists.”
The participating national labs are Argonne, Berkeley, Brookhaven, Idaho, Livermore, Los Alamos, Oak Ridge, Pacific Northwest, and Princeton Plasma Physics.
Wright’s visits to Oak Ridge and Los Alamos emphasize the administration’s view of the importance of nuclear power. In an order signed on his first day as Energy Secretary, Wright said that the Trump administration aims to spark an “American nuclear renaissance” and that the United States should lead the “commercialization of affordable and abundant nuclear energy.”
That energy will be needed to power the U.S. development of energy-intensive AI models. In a video of his tour of Los Alamos, the secretary described the AI race as the “next Manhattan Project,” a reference to the U.S. research program that developed the atomic bomb during the Second World War.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
More than 70 years ago, the Manhattan Project brought together the world’s greatest scientists and engineers here in Los Alamos for a patriotic effort that changed the world.
The next Manhattan Project has arrived and with <a href="https://twitter.com/POTUS?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@POTUS</a> leadership, we will win this critical race. <a href="https://t.co/E40rNzKgJJ">pic.twitter.com/E40rNzKgJJ</a>
&mdash; Secretary Chris Wright (@SecretaryWright) <a href="https://twitter.com/SecretaryWright/status/1894545339899641936?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 26, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

EXCLUSIVE: Trump Energy Sec To Visit Tennessee Nuclear Facility, Take Part In AI Summit

EXCLUSIVE: Trump Energy Sec To Visit TN Nuclear Facility, Take Part In AI Summit

Artificial Intelligence

Politics

Climate is “nowhere near the world’s biggest problem,” and has some benefits worth considering when evaluating its cost, according to Energy Secretary Chris Wright.
Wright appeared on Fox Business on Wednesday and said that the narrative pushed by leftist environmentalists has significant flaws. Wright, who is a longtime critic of radical environmentalism, said that the backlash against fossil fuels inspired by overwrought claims about climate change is unwarranted.
“Everything in life has tradeoffs, but a warmer planet with CO2 is better for growing plants. The world has been getting greener for decades – 14% more greenery around the planet today than there was 40 years ago,” Wright said, before pointing out that “far more people die of the cold than die of the heat.”
“Everything has a tradeoff, but, yeah, there’s pluses to global warming as well as negatives. But the bottom line is it&#8217;s nowhere near the world’s biggest problem today, not even close,” he added.
<iframe loading="lazy" title="Secretary Wright joins FOX Business&#039;s Stuart Varney - February 19th, 2025" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/GsijyIafpPA?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>
President Donald Trump nominated Wright to serve as Secretary of Energy with a background working in the oil and gas and nuclear industries. Wright is in charge of implementing a key plank of Trump’s agenda, a return to American energy dominance through oil and gas production and other energy sources that “can lower the cost of energy, expand job opportunities, and have more stuff made in America,” as Wright said in the interview.
Wright has spoken much more harshly about certain policies crafted on the assumption that climate change is an existential threat. On Monday, the energy secretary spoke via videolink to a conference in London and called the push to get to net zero carbon emissions within the next few decades a “sinister goal.”
&#8220;Net Zero 2050 is a sinister goal. It&#8217;s a terrible goal,&#8221; Wright <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/us-energy-secretary-attacks-sinister-net-zero-goals-singling-out-britain-2025-02-17/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">said</a>. &#8220;The aggressive pursuit of it – and you&#8217;re sitting in a country that has aggressively pursued this goal – has not delivered any benefits, but it&#8217;s delivered tremendous costs.”

Trump Energy Chief: Climate Change ‘Nowhere Near The World’s Biggest Problem’

President Donald Trump expressed confidence on Tuesday when questioned about the quick purge and reinstatement of largely probationary employees at the agency that oversees the U.S. nuclear stockpile.
Employees were laid off from the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) last week before being reinstated over the weekend. Most of those involved were probationary employees, which typically means they were hired or promoted within the last year.
The employees let go from the NNSA were mostly involved in clerical or administrative roles, according to the Department of Energy. Many of those laid off worked on climate and energy efficiency-related projects that do not align with Trump’s agenda for American energy dominance. None of the employees worked directly on weapons-related programs, according to <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/02/17/trump-musk-nuclear-weapons-workers-nnsa/78968238007/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">USA Today</a>.
When asked if he was worried about what turbulence over the layoffs would do to the agency, the president said he was “not at all” concerned and that he was delivering on his agenda to voters.
“I think we have to just do what we have to do,” Trump said. “It&#8217;s amazing what&#8217;s been found right now. It&#8217;s amazing. Some, if we feel that, in some cases, they’ll fire people and then they’ll put some people back, not all of them, because a lot of people were let go.”
“Don’t forget, I got elected on the basis of making our government stronger and smaller because we have millions of people that, obviously, they’re paying millions of people that shouldn’t be paid,” he added.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
Reporter: There was a big wave of probationary federal workers who were fired over the weekend. Some of these workers focused on nuclear weapons security were immediately rehired. Do you have any concerns? 
Trump: No, not at all. I think we have to just do what we have to do.… <a href="https://t.co/enXcCxKVlZ">pic.twitter.com/enXcCxKVlZ</a>
&mdash; Acyn (@Acyn) <a href="https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1891967707534553233?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 18, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
The agency, which is semi-autonomous under the Department of Energy, sent out termination emails late last week before <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/trump-administration-wants-un-fire-nuclear-safety-workers-cant-figure-rcna192345?taid=67b0cdf1e6d2760001470968&amp;utm_campaign=trueanthem&amp;utm_medium=social" target="_blank" rel="noopener">retracting</a> some over the weekend. Managers had difficulty contacting some of the reinstated employees after cutting off their work email accounts.
The number of employees let go from the agency is unclear. The Department of Energy said the layoffs affected less than 50 people. According to <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-energy-department-says-less-than-50-purged-nuclear-security-office-2025-02-16/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Reuters</a>, 325 employees received termination emails.
The confusion over the agency’s employees took place amid widespread cuts to federal agencies being led by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) project, an Elon Musk-led group within the White House that is overseeing an audit of federal employment and spending priorities.

Trump ‘Not At All’ Worried About DOGE Cuts After Reinstatement Of Nuclear Safety Workers

Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)

Elon Musk

Executive

Washington D.C.

A Biden administration official who approved a $1.6 billion loan to a company he invested in recently said he does not regret his decision.
Jigar Shah, former President Joe Biden’s head of the Department of Energy&#8217;s Loan Programs Office, recently <a href="https://www.semafor.com/article/02/11/2025/jigar-shah-has-some-concerns-about-energy-investment-under-trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">told</a> Semafor that he wouldn’t change “a single thing” about his actions in office. A reporter for the outlet asked Shah if he would have done anything differently at the Loan Programs Office (LPO) at the Department of Education, and Shah said no.
“Not a single thing,” Shah said. “To take an office that was shut down by the Obama administration after Solyndra and give it hope again, that just takes the amount of time that it takes.”
Just days before President Donald Trump retook office, Shah finalized a $1.6 billion federal loan to a green energy company in which he was invested, The Washington Free Beacon <a href="https://freebeacon.com/biden-administration/bidens-lame-duck-loan-czar-finalizes-1-6-billion-award-to-green-power-company-he-invested-in/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">reported</a>. Shah made the $100 million investment in Plug Power, a hydrogen fuel developer, through his green financial firm Generate Capital – just before he joined the Biden administration in 2021. Just one month after Shah joined the administration, Plug Power applied for a federal loan from his office.
Republicans had raised concerns about Shah’s ties to the company, but those concerns went nowhere and Shah joined the Biden administration. Shah’s finalization of a loan to Plug Power came just weeks after the Department of Energy’s own inspector general <a href="https://freebeacon.com/biden-harris-administration/significant-risk-of-fraud-federal-watchdog-calls-for-emergency-halt-to-bidens-400-billion-energy-loan-fund/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">asked</a> him to halt all loans from his office due to a “significant risk of fraud&#8221; and conflict-of-interest concerns within the program. Shah ignored the warning and provided billions to green energy companies in the final weeks of the Biden administration, the Free Beacon reported.
During the four years of the Biden administration, the LPO pumped out $400 billion to green energy companies, according to the Free Beacon.
Shah was directly involved in the Plug Power loan process, the Free Beacon found during a public records request, even holding a meeting with the company’s CEO in May 2021. Three days after that meeting, staff in Shah’s office held another meeting focused on Plug Power.
In 2023, Plug Power <a href="https://finance.yahoo.com/news/plug-power-stock-tanks-40-as-company-warns-it-could-run-out-of-money-in-a-year-155101635.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">warned</a> investors it may run out of money within a year, and Morgan Stanley <a href="https://www.barrons.com/articles/plug-power-stock-price-downgrade-b7f666f2" target="_blank" rel="noopener">downgraded</a> the company’s stock due to “significant risk around PLUG&#8217;s business model.&#8221;
This didn’t stop Shah from handing the company another $1.6 billion in the closing days of the Biden administration.

Jigar Shah

Biden Energy Official Who Gave $1.6 Billion To Company He Invested In Says He Has No Regrets

Biden Administration

The Biden administration has finalized a rule that would ban most natural gas hot water heaters, restrictions that critics say are sure to raise the cost of similar appliances.
The Department of Energy (DOE) published the finalized rule in the Federal Register the day after Christmas, but did not send out a press release or other public announcement as in the case of past regulations, according to <a href="https://freebeacon.com/biden-harris-administration/biden-bans-scores-of-natural-gas-water-heaters-driving-up-prices-with-lame-duck-regulations/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Washington Free Beacon</a>.
The rule is scheduled to go into effect in March 2025. It is expected to phase out the production of roughly 40% of new tankless water heaters by 2025, leaving consumers in the United States with fewer options and higher prices. The finalized rule is the latest move the Biden administration has made to restrict household appliances and vehicles in an effort to cut down on emissions.
“The object of these rules is to reduce consumption of natural gas, a goal of the Energy Policy and Conservation Act of 1975, signed into law when America had to import oil and natural gas. Now, however, America is one of the world’s largest energy producers,” The Heritage Foundation’s Diana Furchtgott-Roth wrote in <a href="https://www.dailysignal.com/2024/12/30/obama-took-away-light-bulbs-biden-wants-appliances/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Daily Signal</a>. “The law is outdated and should be repealed.”
Biden has used his executive branch powers to regulate your household appliances because Congress, which answers to the people, refused to pass such restrictive laws,” wrote Furchtgott-Roth, the director of the Center for Energy, Climate, and Environment at the conservative think tank.
Matthew Agen, the American Gas Association’s chief counsel for energy, blasted the new rule in a December 18 <a href="https://www.aga.org/news/news-releases/aga-criticizes-doe-natural-gas-instantaneous-water-heater-rulemaking/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">statement</a>, accusing the Biden administration of violating the Energy Policy and Conservation Act (EPCA) with the sweeping ban.
“DOE’s decision to ban an entire segment of instantaneous water heaters is deeply concerning and irresponsible,” Agen said. “The final rule is a violation of the [EPCA], which prohibits DOE from promulgating a standard that renders a product with a distinct performance characteristic unavailable.”
Agen also said that the Biden administration’s claims about cost savings for consumers are flawed, and the rule will result in much higher costs, especially to low-income households.
“DOE’s estimate of increased cost to customers is not reflective of real-world situations, with direct pricing information from a manufacturer suggesting that the difference in average product price alone is approximately $450 – 200% greater than the $231 difference claimed by DOE to justify the rule. Moreover, the customers most likely to opt for more affordable non-condensing water heaters tend to be low-income and senior households,” Agen said.

Biden Admin Issues Sweeping Ban On Natural Gas Water Heaters

Joe Biden

President-elect <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/donald-trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Donald Trump</a> announced on Saturday evening that he has tapped Chris Wright to lead the U.S. Department of Energy.
&#8220;I am thrilled to announce that Chris Wright will be joining my Administration as both United States Secretary of Energy, and Member of the newly formed Council of National Energy,&#8221; Trump said in a statement.
Trump highlighted Wright&#8217;s career as a leading technologist and entrepreneur in the industry before being nominated to the position.
&#8220;He has worked in Nuclear, Solar, Geothermal, and Oil and Gas,&#8221; he said. &#8220;Most significantly, Chris was one of the pioneers who helped launch the American Shale Revolution that fueled American Energy Independence, and transformed the Global Energy Markets and Geopolitics.&#8221;
Wright said that he was &#8220;honored and grateful&#8221; for the opportunity to serve in the new administration.
&#8220;My dedication to bettering human lives remains steadfast, with a focus on making American energy more affordable, reliable, and secure. Energy is the lifeblood that makes everything in life possible,&#8221; he said. &#8220;Energy matters. I am looking forward to getting to work.&#8221;
<a href="https://www.amiracist.com/?_gl=1*jtghwp*_gcl_au*ODQ1NjYzNTg2LjE3Mjg5MDk3OTE.*_ga*MTc2NzM0NDQ2NS4xNzI4OTA5Nzkx*_ga_CZKR9ZYKJP*MTczMDEyMDgwOS40OS4xLjE3MzAxMjA4MzkuMzAuMC4w" target="_blank" rel="noopener">MATT WALSH’S ‘AM I RACIST?’ NOW STREAMING ON DAILYWIRE+</a>
The statement said that Wright has known and worked with North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum — whom Trump tapped to be the Secretary of the Interior and Chairman of the National Energy Council — for years.
&#8220;This team will drive U.S. Energy Dominance, which will drive down Inflation, win the A.I. arms race with China (and others), and expand American Diplomatic Power to end Wars all across the World,&#8221; Trump said.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
I am honored and grateful for the opportunity from <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@realDonaldTrump</a> to serve our country as U.S. Secretary of Energy. My dedication to bettering human lives remains steadfast, with a focus on making American energy more affordable, reliable, and secure. Energy is the lifeblood… <a href="https://t.co/IfjMQw9xKi">pic.twitter.com/IfjMQw9xKi</a>
— Chris Wright (@ChrisAWright_) <a href="https://twitter.com/ChrisAWright_/status/1857924212868161829?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November 16, 2024</a></blockquote>

Menu