Sullivan: ‘Biden Administration Focused on Shutting Down Our State’
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as the new Secretary of the Interior, whether I vote for or against her confirmation. This is the new reality and context in which I decided my vote. The key issue to me was this: How would a “yes” or a “no” for Congresswoman Haaland help me influence her and the Biden administration to take actions that will limit harm for Alaska, especially our working families. After watching her nomination hearings closely and having had close to three hours of meetings with her myself, I have concluded that a “yes” vote is more likely than a “no” vote to create the opportunity to build a relationship with her and her team, a relationship that could enable me to influence the Department of the Interior’s decisions and action on critical Alaska issues that could benefit our state, like moving forward on the Willow project, which is estimated to create thousands of jobs and bring billions of dollars in revenue to the State of Alaska and North Slope Borough. I took this vote with eyes wide open, however, knowing full well that a number of officials in the Biden administration and their radical environmental allies are hellbent on shutting down our state and crushing opportunities for Alaskans, but I thought if my “yes” vote might be able to influence decisions about Alaska in any positive way, then it might be worth it.
made to me and my fellow Alaskans about our economic future and opportunities. As I stated before, these are not normal times for Alaska and our country. The pandemic has hit Alaska particularly hard, especially the energy, tourism, and commercial fishing sectors, with thousands of jobs lost. The Secretary of the Interior plays an oversized role in our economy, jobs, and future, given that approximately 66% of Alaska is federal land. I was honored to work closely with the Trump administration’s Interior secretaries to achieve several historic wins for our state involving resource development projects, the creation of good jobs in Alaska, access to our federal lands, and the rights of Alaska Natives, particularly Vietnam veterans. Certain members of the Biden administration are focused on reversing all of this Alaska progress which will deepen the challenges for our state, killing jobs by the thousands in our resource development sector, in what I have decried as Biden’s war on Alaska’s economy and working families; but many of the policy decisions of the Biden administration in this regard have not yet been finalized. Republicans, unfortunately, lost control of the U.S. Senate; Congresswoman Haaland is guaranteed to be confirmed
While our consultants are grounded, your surveys can still take ight. Keeping up the momentum. .com
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Spring 2021 I The Alaska Miner I www.alaskaminers.org
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