President Donald Trump is upset with Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke over his announcement two weeks ago that the waters around Florida would be exempt from the offshore oil and gas leasing program, Axios reported on Sunday.
Zinke’s announcement to ban offshore drilling in waters near Florida through 2024 was made just a day after he proposed opening nearly all of the nation’s coasts to drilling, according to The Hill.
It also was made shortly after he met with Florida’s Republican Governor Rick Scott.
However, the interior secretary did not reportedly coordinate with anyone in the administration and did not give advance warning of his decision.
This decision has reportedly created difficulties for the administration, because such a move on offshore leasing policies are set by a statute with a strict process in which certain areas can be taken out of consideration only gradually through a multi-year process that takes into account different factors such as environmental risks, as well as oil and gas resource potential, Axios reported.
Since Zinke did so without apparently following the statute, interested parties from other coastal states will likely use his decision to justify suing the federal government for arbitrarily removing Florida but not their states.
His decision also undercuts Trump’s energy dominance agenda, because part of Florida’s waters have the country’s richest oil and gas resources.
It remains to be seen if this has ruined Zinke’s relationship with Trump, who, sources say, admired him for his service as a Navy SEAL commander and has praised him for his deregulatory work.
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