Gavin Newsom imposed a secret ban on fracking — even as power and gasoline costs in California skyrocketed.
That’s the ruling by Kern County Judge Bernard Barmann Jr., who not too long ago blocked both the secret ban from 2021 and the formal one Newsom imposed in 2024.
Fracking — brief for hydraulic fracturing — is a means to extract oil and gasoline from deposits that are otherwise troublesome to attain. It has revolutionized the American power trade and launched the US as a international superpower in pure gasoline.
It could also increase oil and gasoline manufacturing proper here in California, creating jobs, reducing power costs and producing cleaner gas than would be produced anywhere else in the world.
But Newsom has declared warfare on the fossil gas trade, and has been decided to drive it out of enterprise. All of it was half of an aggressive “climate change” agenda meant to impress the environmental foyer. In addition to aggressive regulation, he tried to make extracting and refining petroleum merchandise virtually unattainable in California. He could not push laws through Sacramento, so he acted, quietly, to shut down permits.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom is attempting to have it both methods: To present the “green” foyer that he opposes fossil fuels, and to present shoppers he cares about their pocketbooks. AP Photo/Reba Saldanha
Newsom didn’t droop or repeal the gasoline tax, but he allowed the state to change, earlier than regular, to the cheaper, winter mix of gas. Getty Images
A whistleblower from California’s Geologic Energy Management Division, or CalGEM, claimed the governor’s workplace was insisting legitimate permits for fracking be denied. Officials who tried to grant permits were allegedly moved out of the means.
And, of course, every time gasoline costs went up — largely due to California’s own insurance policies — Newsom would blame the greed of the oil firms, rather than reducing the gasoline tax.
Refineries have closed, oil firms have moved out of the state and Newsom’s administration is busy attacking or suing the few firms that dare to function in California.
Of course, as the midterm elections neared — the unofficial launch date for the 2028 presidential primaries — Newsom intervened to decrease gasoline costs.
He didn’t droop or repeal the gasoline tax, but he allowed the state to change, earlier than regular, to the cheaper, winter mix of gas. And after vowing to drive the oil and gasoline trade out of locations where it had been for more than a century, like Baldwin Hills, he tried to encourage elevated manufacturing in Kern County.
Newsom is attempting to have it both methods: To present the “green” foyer that he opposes fossil fuels, and to present shoppers he cares about their pocketbooks.
Judge Barmann confirmed just how aggressive, and questionable, Newsom’s ways have been.
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