President Joe Biden met with Saudi Arabia this week in hopes of reaching a deal to increase oil production in order to lower the price of gas at home – as it is a contributing factor to the rise in inflation. He left without a firm commitment that Saudi Arabia will do anything leaving many Americans wondering why he went at all.
At the 00:57 mark to 01:04 in the following video Saudi Arabia says they did not talk about gas prices during the roundtable discussion.
However last Friday, Biden said the Saudis shared his “urgency” to increase oil supply and expects “further steps in the coming weeks,” but Saudi officials say OPEC+ will decide if they will increase production during a meeting on August 3rd. It’s an obvious slight to the President. Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) also mentioned that the country was nearly tapped out of it’s oil production capabilities once it reaches 13 million barrels of oil a day.
Right now, Saudi Arabia is beginning to produce 11 million barrels of oil a day and is a high number they rarely produce at. Going to 13 million barrels a day would set a record for them. According to Goldman Sachs, the oil market is “screaming that it’s very, very tight.”
Saudi climate envoy Adel al-Jubeir was confronted with Biden’s statements by CNBC’s Hadley Gamble over Biden calling the country a “pariah” in 2020. He said Saudi Arabia’s policy is to engage with different countries, including U.S. and China, the kingdom’s two biggest partners. “We build bridges with people, we don’t see one as exclusive of the other.”
Biden recently declared that a Saudi Arabian minister had lied while discussing his recent trip to the country by saying he did not bring up the murder of Jamal Khashoggi.
Late last week Biden flew to Saudi Arabia to meet with the Royal Family and ask them to produce more oil and reduce the costs as well to help ease inflation. Before flying there, however, Biden also pledged to address the murder of Khashoggi directly with the crown prince who he has accused of murdering him.
Biden Says Saudi Arabia Lied About Major Point of Meeting
Following the meeting, Biden held a press conference where he claimed he told (MBS) directly that he couldn’t sit by and not say anything about the murder. Biden even said that MBS addressed the issue, denying his involvement and stressing that America has made “mistakes” before as well.
It turns out that moments after Air Force One took off the runway in Jeddah Saudi Minister of State for Foreign Affairs al-Jubeir, who was at the meeting, called FOX News directly to report he “did not hear” Biden bring up Khashoggi once.
It’s obvious that the Saudi’s brought Biden out to the Kingdom just to slight him. He should not have gone because it just makes us look worse and did not lead to anything concrete. Do you thin the trip was major fail for Biden?
