Shady Lady: In Push to Justify LNG Pause, Granholm Buried Contradictory Energy Study

It never ceases to amaze me the number of mendacious sneks who populated every single corner of the Biden administration, from the White House on down through the nooks and crannies of cabinet-level departments.

DOGE is uncovering much of the purposeful fiduciary malfeasance – money flowing hither and yon with little to no oversight for nefarious, anti-American purposes. Or money that someone could simply have a good time with on the government dime.

Other things are coming to light now, too, though. Sunshine is starting to peek into the recesses where some of the bodies were buried. Where the contrary opinion or evidence that would have disproved a cabinet secretary’s public justification for an action is resurfacing from where it was hidden away.

In January of 2024, in the midst of the Ukraine conflict, with the loss of the Russian Nord Stream pipeline, the Houthis controlling Red Sea shipping lanes, and the reliance of Europe on liquid natural Gas (LNG) imports – particularly from the United States – roiling energy markets around the world, Joe Biden chose to do something absolutely inexplicable under the circumstances.

He paused all LNG shipments to Europe and halted the approval process for export licenses and facilities that were being built/planned in the name of the climate cult.

…During this period, we will take a hard look at the impacts of LNG exports on energy costs, America’s energy security, and our environment. This pause on new LNG approvals sees the climate crisis for what it is: the existential threat of our time…

And took a swipe at ‘MAGA Republicans’ for good measure.

It wasn’t until July that a federal judge in Lousiana ruled on a lawsuit brought by sixteen state attorneys general. He granted their request for a stay against the Biden admin, and the exports slowly began to slowly ramp up again.

Ever deferential to the sanctity of a court’s decision, the Left demurred and accepted defeat quietly.

I kid, I KID.

They were screaming for POTATUS to tell the court to piss up a rope.

…Who cares what a court says? Not the Sierra Club, which says the judge’s ruling doesn’t compel the Administration “to issue any specific decisions.” In other words, the Administration can continue to slow-walk reviews, as it has been doing.

 In his ruling, Judge James Cain said Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm had gone well beyond her department’s regulatory authority.

…Judge Cain, from Louisiana, wrote in his 62-page decision that the policy was “completely without reason or logic” and argued any proposed LNG export “is in the public interest.” 

“LNG exports are governed by the Natural Gas Act (‘NGA’), the purpose of which is to ‘encourage the orderly development of plentiful supplies of electricity and natural gas at reasonable prices,’ ” Cain continued. “The DOE’[s] regulatory authority extends only to imports and exports of natural gas, that is, the act of transporting natural gas to and from the United States. It does not extend upstream to production and downstream to consumption.”

Now that rocks are being turned over in D.C., it turns out Granholm also buried a contradictory staff report that had data and conclusions refuting the very premise they used to enact the LNG pause, to begin with.

The DoE already had a study in hand that showed that increasing exports would have a ‘negligible’ effect on domestic energy prices and, more importantly for the cultists, actually reduce greenhouse emissions by a fraction.

…President Biden, prodded by climate adviser John Podesta, announced a supposedly temporary suspension of LNG project approvals in January of the election year. The stated purpose was so Energy could do a study to determine if increased exports are in the “public interest.” It turns out that DOE career staff had already completed such a study by autumn 2023.

A draft of that study, which was shared with us, shows that increased U.S. LNG exports would have negligible effects on domestic prices while modestly reducing global greenhouse gas emissions. The latter is largely because U.S. LNG exports would displace coal in power production and gas exports from other countries such as Russia.

Unsurprisingly, this information ran counter to the fossil-fuel-hostile administration, which was also desperate to do some deep progressive support massaging.

…DOE staff and lawyers rigorously reviewed the models and findings because these conclusions “are going to receive a lot of scrutiny” and we “need to be able to explain why the model shows reduced emissions,” as one commented in the study’s margins. Another recommended “full tabulated results in an Excel workbook be made available to provide transparency to the public.”

That isn’t what the Biden crowd wanted to hear. They shelved the staff study and imposed their “pause” to motivate progressives during last year’s election. In December, Biden Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm released a different study, which purported to show that “unfettered” LNG exports would increase global emissions and domestic gas prices.

So they spiked it and released one that better suited their message.

…“The Energy Department has learned that former Secretary [Jennifer] Granholm and the Biden White House intentionally buried a lot of data and released a skewed study to discredit the benefits of American LNG,” one source told the Caller. “They were prioritizing their own political ambitions over the interests of the American people, and the administration intentionally deceived the American public to advance an agenda that harmed American energy security, the environment and American lives.”

Which is revolting in its duplicity and could have been disastrous for Europe but is entirely in character for any lowlife connected with the Biden administration.

Turn up the volume … pic.twitter.com/PeCs5Xkvn3

— xTrends (@xtrends) March 5, 2022

Liars and thieves, and none of them ever once acted remotely in the interests of America first.

“Had Harris won,Democrats would undoubtedly have used the study justify permanent export ban&we would never have found out about other study. LNG 2-step another example how BidenDems tried to deceive Americans&they wonder why approval rating record low?” https://t.co/e4BFwBq2Rk

— Fredric U. Dicker (@fud31) March 21, 2025

Think about that again – HAD HARRIS WON

How many lies would be underpinning why we were living in the dystopian hell you knew we had coming HAD HARRIS WON?

Dear God.

Granholm has, as most of these unprincipled charlatans seem to do, failed upwards yet again. My girlfriend Leslie over at Legal Insurrection coincidentally had a recent update on the vile creature as well as an extensive list of her previous sins:

…Now, after stepping down from her top spot in the Energy Department, Granholm is taking a board position at a leading energy firm that benefited from her policy choices. Nick Pope of the Daily Caller News Foundation gives this background.

Granholm will be a board member for Edison International, a major utility holding company, and she will also sit on the board for Southern California Edison (SCE), a subsidiary of the holding company, Edison International announced on Thursday. SCE was part of a group of California-based entities that received $600 million in taxpayer cash from Granholm’s Department of Energy (DOE) in August 2024.

It’s maddening to watch when Granholm should be frogmarched off to the hoosegow, but I haven’t given up hope.

It’s only been two months, and there are lots of rocks yet to flip over.