Donald Trump administration says offshore drilling ‘on the table’; Florida reportedly exempted in leaked docs

The Interior Department has confirmed all options are on the table when it comes to offshore oil drilling.

The Houston Chronicle reported on documents showing the Interior Department has proposals in the works to sell offshore oil drilling leases along the Atlantic Coast. The documents preserve a drilling ban off Florida, but open up most of the Atlantic Coast, including in Georgia, the Carolinas and Virginia. It would also open much of the Gulf beyond the shoreline immediately off of Florida to drilling.

While the administration declined to address specifics of the draft documents reported on by the Texas newspaper, spokespeople provided a statement confirming further exploration has not been dismissed.

“We do not comment on leaked draft/deliberative information. With that said, the Department has been clear that there is a national energy emergency and all options to combat that crisis and win the AI race against China are on the table,” the statement reads.

Based on the Chronicle’s reporting, proposals in the works include opening the eastern Gulf of Mexico and the entire Atlantic Coast, except for Florida. Proposals also look at the Pacific Coast from Washington south through California, as well as portions of Alaska’s Northern Bering Sea.

This would reverse some policies from President Donald Trump’s first term.

The plan as drafted would unveil expansions over the next few weeks, including some sale options in areas currently off limits

In September 2020, Trump signed an order extending a moratorium through June 2032 on offshore oil drilling off Florida’s Gulf Coast and from the Florida Keys north through South Carolina.

But Trump’s position on drilling, especially regarding Florida’s coasts, has shifted significantly since his first election as President in 2016. Trump’s Interior Department in 2018 proposed a similar expansion in drilling, but following instant bipartisan objections from Florida’s congressional delegation, Florida’s coast was quickly exempted.

Then-Gov. Rick Scott, a Republican who now represents Florida in the U.S. Senate, met with administration officials then and said Florida did not want offshore drilling. That was a position maintained by current Gov. Ron DeSantis, also a Republican.

But other coastal Governors in the Southeast on the Atlantic Coast have consistently opposed drilling as well.

Oil companies have not been allowed to drill offshore anywhere along the Atlantic Coast since the early 1980s. Democratic President Barack Obama in March 2010 announced he would end that ban, as reported by NPR, but just a month later, the Deepwater Horizon explosion promoted him to reissue a short-term ban and later issue a five-year ban on offshore oil drilling leases altogether.