Sen. Kevin Cramer, a North Dakota Republican, is calling on President Trump to stop imports of crude oil from Russia and Saudi Arabia in retaliation for the price war that is downing global oil prices and threatening U.S. shale producers.
“While I support continued dialogue, I believe it is critical to take action now to avoid substantial domestic layoffs, displacement, and financial imports,” Cramer wrote in a letter to Trump Wednesday. The North Dakota senator is a former utility regulator in the state who also served as an energy adviser to Trump’s 2016 campaign.
Cramer called on Trump to take “immediate action” to embargo crude oil from Russia, Saudi Arabia, and other OPEC producing countries such as Iraq. The senator specifically listed the administration’s authority under section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962, which the White House has used to levy tariffs on several foreign-made goods, including imports of steel and aluminum.
The United States imported nearly 1.5 million barrels per day of oil from Russia, Saudi Arabia, and Iraq in 2018, Cramer noted.
“Today, these same nations expect our producers and workers to absorb these impacts without recourse,” he added. “We must send the immediate signal; the United States will not be bullied or taken for granted.”
Cramer’s letter is a sign that pressure on Trump from Republican lawmakers to act in oil states is only likely to increase as domestic producers face financial downturns due to cheap prices and low demand amid the coronavirus spread.
And his letter follows one from earlier in the week, when he, Alaska Sen. Dan Sullivan, and 11 other Republican senators urged Saudi officials to back off their intent to flood the markets with oil. That pledge, along with a matching one from Russia, has sparked a price war amid already tough market conditions due to the coronavirus pandemic. On Wednesday, prices for U.S. crude oil plunged to an 18-year low.
The letter also comes the same day Sullivan and Cramer led a call with their Republican colleagues and the Saudi ambassador to the U.S. to discuss the oil markets. Joining the two senators on the call were Texas’s John Cornyn and Ted Cruz, Wyoming’s John Barrasso, Oklahoma’s James Lankford, Lousiana’s Bill Cassidy and John Kennedy, Colorado’s Cory Gardner, and North Dakota’s John Hoeven.
That was a “productive conversation” during which the senators reinforced their letter “in explicit terms,” Mike Anderson, a spokesman for Sullivan, told the Washington Examiner in a statement.
Cramer, in a statement on the call, signaled senators aren’t likely to let up pressure on the Saudis any time soon, saying the U.S. won’t be “bullied” or “blindsided” by allies or otherwise.
“We will continue pressuring and advocating for a course correction from the Saudis and every nation actively engaged in harmful market distortions in the midst of a worldwide pandemic,” he said.
According to Anderson, the Saudi ambassador “committed to relaying their message to the highest levels of Saudi leadership and the Senators look forward to Saudi Arabia’s prompt response.”
