Like MRC Parent, CNS Rooted For Biden To Release Oil From Reserve — Then Scoffed When He Did

Like its Media Research Center parent, CNSNews.com pushed the idea that President Biden should release oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to help lower gas prices — then dismissed its impact when he did. Let’s look at how CNS pushed the idea:

White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki announced the plan on Tuesday when asked about whether the president will tap the Strategic Oil Reserve if gas prices reach a certain price.

“On the economy, I don’t know if you saw The New York Times this morning about the cost of Thanksgiving could be some of the highest that we’ve seen in a long time. Obviously, you heard the president talk about gas prices at that CNN town hall. Would there be a price that gas would have to get that the president would say, okay, now’s the time to tap the Strategic Petroleum Reserve?” a reporter asked.

— Melanie Arter, Oct. 26

The president has not yet said whether he will tap into the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, although “he’s certainly looking at that,” Granholm said. She said it depends on the price forecast due out in a few days.

— Susan Jones, Nov. 8

The White House on Tuesday said that it is “closely and directly monitoring” gas prices after a group of 11 Democrats sent a letter to President Joe Biden asking him to explore options like banning crude oil exports and tapping the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to lower prices at the pump.

— Melanie Arter, Nov. 9

Berman asked if Raimondo were still governor of Rhode Island would she be asking President Biden to open up the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.

— Melanie Arter, Nov. 10

When Biden made the decision to release oil from the SPR, CNS quickly went into attack mode. We already noted how CNS published numerous false claims by Donald Trump about the SPR that went unchallenged, and how reporter Susan Jones scoffed that it “may lower fuel prices just a little for a short time.”

Managing editor Michael W. Chapman similarly dismissed in a Nov. 23 article:

President Joe Biden’s decision to release 50 million barrels of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to lower gas prices is “less than three days of U.S. oil consumption,” and will have “no meaningful impact on gas prices,” said Steve Milloy, a former Trump EPA transition member and the founder of JunkScience.com.

[…]

In a Nov. 23 tweet, Milloy wrote, “Joe Biden is going to release 50 million barrels of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. That is less than three days of US oil consumption (18 million barrels/day during the pandemic year of 2020). The release will have no meaningful impact on gas prices. Ridiculous.”

Chapman censored the fact that the SPR release was coordinated with releases from other countries to have a greater impact on prices.

The next day, Jones returned to dismiss the SPR release anew as “an attempt to temporarily reduce gasoline prices by a few pennies,” then mocked Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm for not answering a question about how much oil the U.S. uses daily to her satisfaction.

That sort of lockstep movement between CNS and the MRC appears to show that the “news” organization has no editorial independence from its parent — and is little more than a right-wing propaganda rag.