A view of the Esther offshore oil and gas platform in the Pacific Ocean on January 5, 2025 in Seal Beach, California.
Mario Tama | Getty Images
President-elect Donald Trump said Tuesday he would impeach the president Joe Bidena ban on offshore drilling along most of the US coast as soon as he takes office.
“I intend to repeal it on day one,” Trump said at a press conference, noting, however, that repealing the ban may require going to court.
Biden announced Monday that he would protect 625 million acres of ocean from offshore oil and gas drilling along the East and West Coasts, the eastern Gulf of Mexico and Alaska's northern Bering Sea. The president issued the ban under a provision of the Outer Continental Shelves Act of 1953.
Trump's order to repeal the ban will likely go to court and could ultimately be invalidated.
During his first term, Trump tried to issue an executive order reversing President Barack Obama's use of a law to protect Arctic and Atlantic waters from offshore drilling. A federal court ultimately ruled that Trump's order was unlawful and that repealing the ban would require an act of Congress.
The Republican Party has a slim majority in both houses of the new Congress.