“As the Biden administration announces drastic steps to push forward its green energy scheme, it faces determined opposition, not from Republicans, but from radical environmental groups. Paradoxically, Biden’s actions mean that U.S. mines that were once shut down by congressional Democrats, will now be subsidized by the Biden administration to reopen.”

“One such mine is located in Mountain Pass, California, surrounded by the Mojave Desert. In 1998, at the urging of California Democrats Senator Diane Feinstein and Representative George Miller, the mine was raided by more than two dozen federal, state, and local environmental agencies over a dead tortoise and a freshwater spill. Actions taken by government agencies put the mine out of business while it was producing rare earths, which are exotic materials critical to U.S. high-tech weapons systems, electric cars, and smartphones. The mine was the source of nearly all rare-earth metals for the United States, but after it was shut down, communist China became the primary source for America’s rare earths[.]”

“At the end of the first quarter, Biden announced that his green energy agenda was a national emergency and thus activated the Defense Production Act (DPA) of 1950 declaring green energy a matter of national security. … Now, using the DPA, Biden has ordered the Department of Defense to subsidize the reopening of the mine at Mountain Pass to produce elements for national defense, and also to meet his transition to clean energy goals. Rare earths and other minerals such as lithium are essential to powering Biden’s attempt at a transition to renewable energy and away from fossil fuels.”

“A militant environmental organization, Deep Green Resistance (DGR), says on its website that it is ‘training revolutionaries’ to stop projects such as the Thacker Pass lithium mine [and Mountain Pass.] … Environmental groups such as DGR say they have no use for Biden’s green energy transition.”

Originally published here at The Epoch Times on 12 June 2022.