Biden dials back fight with Saudi Arabia as gas prices drop
Katherine Doyle
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President Joe Biden’s promised reckoning for Saudi Arabia has faded as the spike in energy prices has done the same, leaving the White House to temper Democratic ire.
When a coalition of oil-producing states led by Saudi Arabia slashed oil production quotas weeks before the midterm elections, defying Washington with a threat of higher gasoline prices, Biden said his administration would take “action” to reevaluate the relationship between Saudi Arabia and the United States. As Democratic allies threatened to reshape the two countries’ decadeslong security arrangement, Biden vowed “consequences” for the kingdom once a review concluded. Some accused Riyadh of siding with Russian President Vladimir Putin amid the war in Ukraine.
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The White House said U.S. politics were not a factor as it privately urged members of OPEC+ to reverse course. But as Washington lashed out at Saudi Arabia, the dispute renewed concerns about energy-producing countries.
“If you have energy equities and two of the world’s largest producers are in a massive spat, that contributes to uncertainty,” said an energy adviser in the Trump administration.
Months later, the White House has said little about the scope and timeline for its assessment, and aides suggest an outcome is unlikely. The White House has credited the president with lowering gas prices by tapping the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.
Instead, the administration has taken steps to stall action that could upset a delicate effort to align the two nations.
In a controversial decision last month, the Biden administration moved to shield Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in a legal case over the slaying of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. According to a March report by the Wall Street Journal, Saudi officials had requested the administration’s support in the case.
Withdrawing a vote on his Yemen War Powers Resolution last week, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) explained that the Biden administration had agreed to continue working with his office to end the war. The bipartisan bill would have blocked U.S. backing for the Saudi-led conflict.
Similar resolutions passed the Senate during the Trump administration, backed by Democratic senators. Some of Biden’s closest advisers, including the president’s now-national security adviser Jake Sullivan, Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman, Domestic Policy Council Director Susan Rice, and others, endorsed a 2019 measure that passed both chambers of Congress, only to be vetoed by former President Donald Trump. In 2018, Biden’s Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines endorsed an earlier proposal.
Now, Sanders’s announcement came as talking points privately circulated by the White House said Biden’s advisers were “strongly opposed” to the legislation and would recommend a veto if it passed, the Intercept reported.
At the center is Biden’s relationship with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, which began to deteriorate on the campaign trail as the then-candidate vowed to hold Saudi Arabia accountable for Khashoggi’s death and asserted “very little social redeeming value in the present government.”
After taking office, Biden’s administration deemed the prince complicit in Khashoggi’s assassination, according to a U.S. intelligence report.
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But Biden’s visit in July presumed an end to the kingdom’s “pariah” status. In July, Biden met face-to-face with the crown prince after the White House maintained early on that the president’s “appropriate counterpart” was King Salman bin Abdulaziz, Saudi Arabia’s aging ruler.
Asked whether Biden planned to follow through on the consequences he promised for Saudi Arabia after it slashed oil production, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said a bipartisan assessment was underway and reiterated the two nations’ 80-year history.