0:00 Hey, Digital Wildcat is Nimble Fatty here. I'm talking today about the Mark, the Minerals and Royalties Conference. April 14th and 15th at the Posto Hotel. Colin's gonna be up there as part of a
0:13 panel talking about AI. It's gonna be really cool. It's the best party. It's the best minerals conference. We'd love to have you guys there. So if you go to mineralsconferencecom to sign up and
0:25 you use promo code DW2025, they'll give you a hundred bucks off Tom Nimble Fatty sent you
0:56 All righty, so if we're going to do this on a scale of like one to 10 and one is a substitute teacher in school type change and 10 is like the gates of hell opening. What is the Trump administration
1:14 six weeks in versus Biden? What's the change been like? What's the vibe in DC? Oh, so I generally do not like to ask one to 10 scoring questions, but I will say in terms of vibeshift, it's like
1:25 a 10. It's like an 11. Yeah, it's
1:29 it is significant in and it's just it's a 180 in almost every sense of the term. Give me one weird specific in your day to day life that has happened in the last six weeks or you weren't, holy cow,
1:48 that never would have happened. You know, two years ago. It's just the volume of stuff that is coming at us that is really unprecedented. I mean, any change in administration, there is a ramp up
2:00 in pace. This one is interesting 'cause it's, first of all, we're playing a lot more offense in defense, which is super, super cool and a lot of fun. There is a little bit of defense, but it's
2:10 mostly offense.
2:15 But the pace, I mean, they have been, the Trump administration and his allies have been planning for this for the last two years. And I think the pace that we've seen is unprecedented for almost
2:24 any administration. Oh, interesting. Yeah. And the pace at which they've gotten their nominees in place, the pace at which they've appointed personnel, the pace at which they've, you know,
2:36 addressed, you know, put out executive orders and policy. It's just, it has been incredibly rapid. And so playing offense, tell me what that means So it means when. And during the Biden
2:50 administration, we were kind of on defense, and the oil and gas industry was often justifying its existence. And now. That's a nice way to put it. Right. It wasn't a great feeling, right? We
3:02 were. A lot of times it was trying to make not great policy less bad was the goal. Now we have a president and an administration that is loudly proclaimed the benefits of American oil and gas and
3:19 the benefit of making oil and gas in America and how it is foundational to keeping inflation low, to keeping jobs here in the US. And when you start from that point, it's a lot easier to then pivot
3:31 to good policy. Yeah. So, Trump gets elected, do you guys at AXPC put together like an action item list, a wish list, walk me through kind of internal. politics on what you did to get ready for
3:50 this. Sure, yeah. So, I mean, it's our job to kind of do risk management. So we started scenario planning before the election. And we talked about, okay, what's gonna happen if there's Trump
3:59 administration? What's gonna happen if there's a Harris administration? And how are we gonna approach that? And the priorities don't change, but sort of how far you can go and what you can ask for
4:12 and how well it's gonna be received certainly does So I would say first on our list is regulatory policy. The Biden administration had the most aggressive regulatory policy. It's like probably going
4:26 back to like depression era,
4:30 FDR. And so there is a lot of regulation across the government that we need to fix or undo. Give me like two weird wonky ones that people would be like, you're kidding government actually cares
4:45 about that there i mean the weird i mean I think, I don't know that they're weird and wonky, but like the EPA methane regulations is one that's a huge priority. The SEC climate disclosure rule
4:56 where all public companies have to go through this like rigorous and potentially like, you know, very legally fraught disclosure around their climate liability. That was something that not just oil
5:07 and gas cared about, but every public company cared about. So it was, it was really across agencies that they took, they said, you know, the Biden administration said they were taking a whole of
5:18 government approach to climate and to phasing out fossil fuels and they did. So reversing that is not something that can happen overnight, even under this very aggressive pace we've seen. It takes
5:30 a lot of time and a lot of process, which isn't a lot of fun. But you have, we've put in the work to sort of say, okay, here's how you can fix the EPA methane regulation. Let's get rid of the
5:41 methane tax entirely, which actually Congress has already acted on.
5:48 How do you, you know, what regulations do we want to tweak and what do we want to completely undo? One of my fun, one of the funnest executive orders though, I think so far has been like the ban
5:55 on like, you know, overturning the ban on plastic straws. I don't know that there actually was a ban on plastic straws, but I'm like, bring back the plastic straw. So they've done a really good
6:05 job of sort of identifying those 80 issues and just, you know, moving forward very aggressively on. I think it's that, and I don't know that I want to be cast in the role of defending anyone
6:17 'cause kind of as a Senate goal, old libertarian, I feel like I need to make fun of everyone, but I do like the fact that the rapid fire throw everything at 'em with stuff like the plastic straws,
6:33 the Gulf of America. The Gulf of America, yeah. I mean, it's like you're dangling something in front of the kids, so they'll go play with that so you can really get some stuff. Absolutely.
6:44 Absolutely. That's so great. Yeah. I mean, I think it's really interesting what Doge is doing. And the approach to the federal government has grown exponentially since post-COVID and under the
6:59 Biden administration. And so taking a really good look at where have we added, is this really helping Americans and their everyday lives, or do we need to cut back? And clearly there are places we
7:13 need to cut back. And so that has really turned things on their head. Now, I do think there's risk of going too far there from an energy perspective. We need people that approve permits in place
7:25 in the district and field offices so that people on federal lands can continue to drill. But let's take a whole-of-government approach look at that and see who is adding value and see who's not.
7:37 I'm all for the sledgehammer. I kind of like the the slow-term or approach because I think you're right.
7:44 2019's budget versus last year. I mean, we spent 40, 45 more money. Yeah, yeah. I mean, did. Just post COVID. Like the government was not too small. It's too funny, right? I mean, it
7:57 wasn't. So no one was complaining about that at that point. So can we just get back to those levels? That would be great. Yeah, and that would, and that would balance the budget actually. You
8:08 know, if we were able to cut back to four trillion, four and a half trillion Certainly take us in the right direction, for sure. We'd be, we'd be closer. So, the thing I don't understand is,
8:21 what is the argument against Daesh? Because when I, you know, I've always held this position on Trump that Trump's just an unlikable Bill Clinton. I mean, he's not doing anything that Bill
8:35 Clinton had done. I mean, anything you want to say bad about Trump, it's like, yeah. Yeah, yeah Clinton did it first. Come on. And so is there really an intellectual policy argument against
8:50 the stuff, or is it just your sacred cows are getting gordoned, so you're gonna fight and - I don't think - Bird Tesla dealer shuts down and - I haven't heard a good argument against the concept of
9:03 doge that we should be promoting government efficiency and taking a hard look at the federal bureaucracy and trimming where that's appropriate And I, most Democrats have a hard time saying that
9:15 shouldn't exist. The problem is, is that every group that you're looking at, you know, has, you know, is a special interest, right? And has a constituency that will push back. And so you do
9:28 hear those sort of more targeted, the after-effective what doge is doing, defending, you know, some of the cuts and some are defensible and some aren't.
9:41 But the concept of government efficiency is something that I don't think either a party can, you know, with a straight face argue against. Yeah, I think not, and I mean, and to his credit, Al
9:52 Gore actually did a fairly good job of government efficiency. I think they got rid of half a million workers in the federal government and lo and behold, it kept going. It kept, we lived to fight
10:03 another day, yeah. To fight another day And so, but you know, the other thing I find interesting 'cause you know, all my Facebook from liberal friends on Facebook are posting every day about the
10:19 horrors of all these cuts and all. They never will give you a specific. Yeah. You know, it's like, I mean, they're line items on the Doge website. We can pick any one of them. All right,
10:29 should we get rid of this or not? Well, a lot of the debate is really around like what is America's place in the world, right? There's the USAID funding. know, that I think is probably a
10:42 reasonable debate to have, you know, what what role does America have and something like that. But I think a lot of what you're seeing too is, you know, there are a lot of third party groups,
10:53 liberal groups for the most part that no one knew was, you know, was getting a significant, we're getting a significant amount of federal funding and exposing that and shining a light on that has
11:03 been what I think is one of the most important thing that Tosh has done. So have any of the Doge type actions bled over into energy policy or energy administration?
11:19 It's kind of what I alluded to at the beginning is, you know, one of the things Doge is looking at is the federal workforce, right? And
11:28 there are a lot of folks in the federal workforce that are really critical to the the president's energy dominance agenda at BLM. producer on federal lands, ensuring that you are getting your
11:41 permits approved in a timely manner. Those go through the field offices and state offices. And those are really important folks. Now, some of them are new to their job. Some of them may have been
11:50 added because there's been a shortage. And so there has been maybe not quite yet some unintended consequences of those folks losing their job, but there has been a lot of concern around that. One
12:06 of the most important things that the federal government does is approve permits. And this administration has said very clearly, I want these permits approved. They have to go through a process.
12:16 And we need the staff there that is able to approve those permits.
12:21 Can it be done more efficiently? Maybe, maybe, but some of those offices have been short staffed for a while. So I mean, these are enormous federal agencies. Like I am sure that there is like
12:33 places to cut. Um, but a lot of the field office workers, um, are doing good work and have been short staffed. So is there, can it be done more efficiency? Probably. And that actually brings
12:43 up another question, which is permitting reform. Like, can we actually, if you want to streamline the process by which these permits get approved, then we need permitting reform, which is
12:54 another thing that you hear a lot about. We need Congress to do permitting reform so that an administration like president Trump can have a more streamlined process to approve these permits. So
13:07 where did Manchin's efforts get to on that? It felt like maybe he got the ball on the green, but you know, and he was putting, but. Yeah, so there were some limited permit reforms done in the
13:23 last debt limit bill, the Fiscal Responsibility Act. That's also where the Mountain Valley pipeline got approved You know, you could maybe consider that a first down after that.
13:37 Manchin and Barrasso on a bipartisan basis worked together on some permitting reform within their jurisdiction, which is primarily federal land, DOE, so it impacted LNG exports, it impacted
13:48 federal land's production. It didn't get into NEPA, which is really the foundational piece for a lot of the permit problems that we see. It's the most litigated statute in the federal government
14:03 And so what we need is Manchin Barasso coupled with meaningful NEPA reform to be more of a comprehensive permit reform. Because the Manchin bill, I actually read it, don't ask why I have time on my
14:17 hands to read it, but I actually read it. It kind of felt like pretty pleased could we do this. That's sort of what the vibe was. It didn't say, hey, you're going to get these permits done in 60
14:30 days or they're approved I mean, that didn't seem to be any hammer in it. Well, a huge problem in permitting reform, like you can expedite the amount of time it takes to get a permit and that's a
14:42 good thing, but where a lot of the problems we see are actually in the courts because a lot of the ENGOs use the judicial system to then hold up a permit. So let's say you get your permit, that's
14:54 gonna be challenged in court and then that's gonna be appealed. And so it's actually the judicial piece of it that might take even longer than the permit piece of it And so permitting reform without
15:05 judicial reform isn't meaningful because if you just do a timeline without reforming the judicial process, that's just gonna give the ENGOs another reason to sue. They said, well, they didn't
15:16 actually perform their due diligence, they did it in 30 days. You can't do due diligence in 30 days. So you need it all together or else they're just gonna find another way to hold up these
15:26 projects. I dropped a podcast this morning with some of the guys from the Mobius Risk Group and they're the folks that help you with hedging and like.
15:35 And we talked about that, that the thing that worries me is the judiciary. 'Cause I mean, it's a single judge appointed somewhere who puts a freeze on something. And it takes two years to go
15:46 litigate it. You gotta get through the appellate. Yeah, then God forbid you get it to the Supreme Court. Yeah, a lot of times the judiciary is really kind of moving the goalposts in terms of what
15:59 the, you know, federal bureaucrats are supposed to be looking at too, right? Like how, how wide is their scope, you know, how, you know, and so, so the judiciary has really moved the ball
16:10 quite a bit or moved the goalpost quite a bit in terms of, you know, what is supposed to be accounted for in these permits. And sometimes groups sue that weren't even a part of the comment process.
16:21 I mean, these, to get a permit is an incredibly robust process. And so you can, you can apply for a permit, you can go through a really rigorous process, you can get public comment, and then
16:30 you can get your permit. And then some group that wasn't even involved process and didn't provide inputs can then come in and sue and stop your project. I mean, it's, it's, it's a, it's not a
16:38 great system. Yeah. The, um, and it's, you know, we've got the Chevron deference case now. So great. Uh, I think that's better policy. But at the end of the day, it still feels like a lone
16:53 federal judge just wings it. Yeah. Some of them don't mind being overturned. They just want to do this. Am I being too cynical? Well, I mean, I, I mean, I think that's what the appeals
17:05 process is for, right? Which unfortunately takes extra time. But yeah, I mean, there's a lot of rogue, um, you know, judges out there, I would, I would presume. And, and you know, the
17:15 process is such that then that can be appealed. Um, but yeah, it's, it's there, there is real reform that needs to happen. And, and it It is incredibly important. I mean, one of the things
17:26 that Chevron deference. being overturned is it's giving the power back to Congress, right? And Congress really needs to step up and be more clear into what they want and what they don't want. Um,
17:37 and so. Oh, thank God.
17:41 The, um, because you and I were on a panel together ever at NAIP and I think I, I said this, um, at the end of the day, Trump likes a lower oil prices Yep. He just, uh, he's all about it and
17:58 that's what we're going to get. Um, but I do think the trade that needs to happen is let us go build stuff. I mean, we need pipelines everywhere. We need power lines everywhere. We need LNG
18:11 facilities. And so if we could get a really rope and I'm, you know, again, I'm a libertarian. So I hate the federal government doing anything, but the feds do need to step in and just say, Hey,
18:23 we gotta build this stuff. And it's gonna go across state lines. And I'm sorry about the blunt nose leopard lizard, but I don't really care about the blunt nose leopard lizard. These, hey, did I
18:34 tell, say my, tell my blunt nose leopard I don't think so. I have my guess. Is that a real animal? It's a real animal. And it's the reason it's almost extinct is the single dumbest animal on the
18:46 planet. Like God came down and said, I want a really idiotic animal here. And it's gonna go extinct because it's stupid So in California, we had a project, I will never do oil and gas again ever
18:59 in California. We had a project and we had to hire a biologist to monitor the habitat of the blunt nose leopard lizard. And when one would die, we'd have to pay for an autopsy on the blunt nose to
19:12 make sure that it died from natural college. Natural causes, oh my gosh. And the reason they would die as a truck would come in and
19:19 they'd come, they'd get up on their hind legs and they kind of run like this and they would jump into the side of the truck. What? I mean, I don't know if they were stupid or just depressed.
19:30 But we dealt with this all the time. Statute of limitation has probably passed, so I'll go ahead and just fast up to this. Oh boy. Ag has a lot of exemptions that oil and gas don't have,
19:42 particularly in California. Okay. And so magically the farmer out there on all this dusty land wound up with 300 cows that could run around and trample all over the blunt nose. Oh my gosh
19:56 They're, they're, they're, they're sanctuary and amazing. The blunt nose, leopard lizard, maybe. And that was the exemption. Oh yeah. Exactly, agriculture could do it. I mean, I don't know
20:07 what they were eating 'cause it looked like Mars, where we were in the middle. But yeah, it's just ridiculous that we have these type things that hold everything up. And that we find those things
20:19 so late in the process. Yeah. I mean, if we came to you and said, hey, here's where we want to build a pipeline. Bontnose leopard lizards right there. Okay, we'll go change. That's okay, but
20:30 it's like years later, we're suing for that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, our NEPA was never supposed to be - What is NEPA? NEPA is like a coordinating statute. So it's the national
20:42 environmental, oh gosh, no, I don't remember it. But it's a coordinating statute, but it's kind of taken on a life of its own. And it's how you conduct an environmental review for a major
20:55 project, a major infrastructure project. And so it was, but it was created in the 1970s. And think of what has changed since the 1970s, right? It is no longer,
21:08 and it has grown since the 1970s, quite a bit, because again, a lot of the judiciary continues to sort of expand its interpretation of NEPA. So we need to get back to a more reasonable process,
21:19 but that cannot really, I mean, I believe we really need Congress to act on that. to put in some reasonable timeframes, to put in some reasonable limitations, and then
21:30 to address the judicial review issues that we've seen in the courts as well. And without that, it's gonna be really challenging to continue to be able to build a modern energy infrastructure,
21:41 'cause you're exactly right. The president has said he wants lower oil prices, lower energy prices.
21:49 But I think one of the things he means is like, we need to be able to build a modern infrastructure, right? And when he says drill baby drill, one of the things that I think about is build baby
21:57 build, we need to be able to build that infrastructure so that the abundant resources that we have are able to travel more efficiently to the places where they are needed most, because we are much
22:13 more infrastructure constrained than we are resource constrained.
22:17 And I actually think as an oil and gas person, I could live with that trade just. because at the end of the day, yes, I'm going to make less money. Yes, I may wind up just breaking even, but
22:34 expanding my runway that much further and making my business in effect that much wider and that much more efficient. It's probably an okay trade. I mean, given what we've been through. Yeah. I
22:47 mean, to be clear, as you know, as you know, the president doesn't control energy prices, right? But he's made very clear where he wants them to go. And I think, you know, to me, if we can
22:59 think about, to your point, like creating those efficiencies in the system and
23:05 making, you know, reducing some of the regulation, making, you know, right sizing regulation so that you can produce and transport energy more efficiently, that kind of lifts all ships, right?
23:17 It helps you operate
23:20 your business more efficiently and it helps get energy. more cost effectively where it needs to go. Well, and potentially if you can plan longer term as well, you know, if we can build a bunch
23:34 more LNG terminals, okay, maybe somebody in the Ainsville can actually drill it to 50 gas, you know? Okay, 'cause we can export it to Europe or whatever. Yeah, what I hear most from my
23:47 companies is the need for durability, you know, it's avoiding that, you know, significant shifts, you know, and pendulum, you know, significant pendulum swings. So can we plan for the longer
23:60 term? I think is what, you know, most companies are really looking for, is that certainty? Yeah, so what's on the list? When you're talking to
24:11 the members, what do they want? What do they want? So we talked a little bit about regulatory policy and you know, addressing regulatory policy. The president has already lifted the LNG export
24:21 pause and started to approve LNG export. So that's moving in the right direction. Now did Biden actually do that since he didn't realize he had been in the first place? Yeah, there may have been a
24:35 semantics issue there. I don't know exactly what happened, but there was definitely a pause when - Now are there any Washington rumors that literally they were just signing that stuff at the pen and
24:44 he didn't know?
24:46 No comment? There were a lot of stories that he was maybe not totally aware of everything that was going on. Yeah, it's so crazy. And I will say for the LNG export, I believe that that was a
25:00 secretarial order, maybe not something that the president had to sign. An executive order. It was not an executive order, but - But they paused LNG export orders. like there was no way about that.
25:12 There was a White House press release on that. Was it McCarthy he told? Or was it Johnson? No, Speaker Johnson. Speaker Johnson, yeah, no, I didn't do that. Right, who has a lot of the, you
25:23 know, production in his district that gets exported through some of those facilities, and so is very well aware of it. Right. So yeah, so that was fascinating. So moving in the right direction
25:34 there, they've already issued some conditional approvals And so, you know, clearly like that has been a 180 shift.
25:44 Tax reform is another huge thing that Congress is gonna be looking at. So all of the Trump Tax Cut and Jobs Act, tax provisions are almost all of them, will expire at the end of the year. And so,
25:58 and then the president also had a number of tax policies that he talked about during the campaign, such as no tax on tips, Congress is going to be looking to get across the finish line. So this is
26:09 actually going to be an enormous year for tax policy. So from our perspective, making sure the corporate rate doesn't go up, uh, because you know, they have, they have to look for pay for us for
26:19 a lot of the stuff. Um, and then, uh, addressing the tax treatment of IDCs, this is a little bit weedy, but, um, intangible drilling costs. If your company falls under the corporate
26:30 alternative minimum tax is no longer deductible in the calendar year in which they're incurred So we want to, you know, try to make sure that that is addressed because that was something that
26:38 happened in the IRA and is clearly really important to, um, ensuring that our companies can continue to deploy capital, um, for, for development. Yeah, the, I would think given the history
26:52 we've had of Texans on the ways of means committee, that if we could just kind of keep the tax code where it is, generally speaking, I mean, sure. We always want tweaks. Yeah. I think oil and
27:04 gas would be all right. 'Cause I mean, what more could we truly be asking for? Yeah, I mean, the IDC
27:12 fix is the most important one from our perspective, yeah. But what did the IRA do? So it established a corporate alternative minimum tax, which was one of the ways they paid for the IRA. And so
27:24 if you fall under this corporate alternative minimum tax, it's kind of poorly named. You can no longer deduct your intangible drilling costs in the year that you're incurred the way every other
27:32 independent oil and gas company can You have to amortize them over several years. And so that was one of the ways that Democrats raised money to pay for the IRA. So that's something we would like to
27:48 see addressed. But other than that, undoing that sort of provision, other than that, I mean, no, the oil and gas industry is not really an industry that generally asks for handouts or special
28:01 treatment And so maintaining other than that one provision,
28:06 and getting some targeted fixes is the priority. Yeah, 'cause I mean, at the end of the day, you always hear your subsidizing oil and gas. We don't get subsidies. No, no, no, no. You can
28:16 make an argument of okay, you guys get some accelerated depreciation that other folks don't get, okay, maybe. But I mean, at the end of the day, nobody's cutting a check. No, no, for sure.
28:28 And who else is paying
28:32 cents off
28:34 the top in terms of royalties to state governments? The oil and gas industry adds a lot more to the federal government bottom line than it takes. 'Cause it doesn't take right between royalties and
28:47 taxes, right, like they are a huge contributor to both the economy, but also to the federal budget. So that is a silly argument. Yeah, I'm tired of that. Yeah
29:00 So what else do the members want?
29:06 We've talked about regulatory certainty. We've talked about tax sort of sensible tax policy. We've talked about
29:16 LNG exports. We've talked about permitting reform, federal lands, I guess would be the other bucket of things that we've talked about. So this is all under the Department of Interior BLM. So as
29:29 you know, every administration, Republican and Democrat up until President Biden had a very robust federal leasing program. It is required by law that lands that are sort of dedicated to mineral
29:43 development, be leased on a quarterly basis. And President Biden basically just stopped doing that. They were then ordered by a court to do it, and they really would only put up for lease, sort
29:54 of some less desirable properties. returning to a robust federal leasing process. But there were 9, 000 permits available, right? Wasn't that the - There was, which was a ridiculous argument
30:05 'cause some of those permits were litigated as you know you can't actively produce on every single permit. We're not gonna let you build a pipeline to those places. Yeah, exactly, exactly. Yeah.
30:14 So we wanna return to federal leasing which is again, a revenue generator for the federal government and a return to a more timely permitting process. To, because in New Mexico, as you know, it
30:29 takes a year to get an APD. Whereas if you go across the border in Texas, it'll take a week. So we need more timely permitting where there are existing leases and where our companies do wanna
30:40 produce. The other part of the permitting that I heard was an issue. It's not just the drill site permit, it's the building the pipeline here. The right of ways, exactly. Right of ways, these
30:53 mounts, that sort of stuff that just get gummed up. forever. Yeah, I know that in some places out West, you know,
31:03 BLM is actually pretty good, but then there'll be a forestry service permit that, you know, they need. And, you know, that's, that's can be a huge problem. And so it's not just there, there
31:13 are numerous agencies involved, some of which are more helpful than others. But yeah, the layers of permits that are needed to produce on federal lands are pretty extensive. Because the, um,
31:28 the interesting thing, I think kind of like overlaying, laying all of this is, and is this true? My understanding is that the Obama administration changed from a digital permitting process to a
31:45 paper permitting process Is that true? I've heard literally you can call in and say, Hey, where's my permit on this? And they'll say, I'm sorry, I don't have the paperwork in front of me. I
31:59 don't know about that. I'd have to look at it. I do know that the Biden administration updated their database where they count how many outstanding permits there are and that number that, you know,
32:13 they were saying from the White House podium that Jen Psaki was touting was like 8, 000 permits. They were like, oh, it's actually 4, 000. We were just discounting, yeah. Double counting Yeah,
32:24 so it's, you know, that program is, you know, is a bit of a morass, and we need a little more transparency in it, I'd have to check on the paper question. So let's go crystal ball. Okay.
32:39 Feels like we do these podcasts at least once a year. We're on a panel once a year or something like that. So in a year, I'm sure we'll be doing this again. Tell me what happened in a year. In a
32:51 year what, are we talking about that you got done? gosh, that is hard to say just again, because the pace has been breakneck. And so, uh, you know, it's, it's, it's, that is tricky. So I
33:07 think you'll see, um, out of EPA, I think the gosh, I'm going to knock on wood because now I make, I get nervous making these predictions. Uh, I think the methane tax will be repealed. All
33:20 right. I think that'll be gone. Um, I think some of the EPA regulatory policies will be, uh, improved, um, uh, or will be very close to final. That takes some time. Um, but those are in
33:35 progress. Um, you know, I, I think the, the, the, uh, you know, I think on federal lands, I think you'll see a real reversal in terms of, um, again, leasing and permits and that sort of
33:48 thing. I think you'll see permits issued for infrastructure projects. pipelines and the like. I think the big question to me is what's happening on the global stage, what's happening with Russia,
34:03 what's happening with Iran, and how does that impact the
34:11 commodity markets and that sort of thing. And that I do not intend to use my crystal ball for, because there's a lot of uncertainty there. No, that's fair. I mean, my deal is, I
34:23 think whatever the administration can control, the cabinet secretaries can control, I think we'll get that stuff done. Yeah. The issue I have is any of the things that you were talking about that
34:37 need congressional approval. I don't know if we can get that stuff done in the face of a global trade war with all the tariffs. It's not that I'm necessarily against. putting the tariffs in place
34:55 and going after that, I've lived through a pandemic where I didn't get toilet paper. So I kind of would like to have some manufacturing capability here, but I just don't know with that turmoil if
35:09 you're going to be able to do stuff in Congress. So I think it's an interesting point, and I think your point about questioning how much Congress can get done is a very real one. I don't know, I
35:19 think I would separate the two I think Congress' margins are very small right now, like very small. In the house, they have about a two-seam majority right now. And as you know - Well, Massey's
35:30 always a no vote. Yeah, exactly right, and as you know, like - And I'm a
35:37 fan of Massey, but - I know you are. But it's a no vote, yeah. And so it's hard to get anything done. It's hard to get big things done when you've got a couple members You've got, well, you've
35:52 got a handful of members that just always want to say no and can find a reason to go no. Now, at the same time, we have a really influential president who has a lot of sway over a lot of members of
36:07 Congress. And I think if he sees this as inherent to his agenda and getting things accomplished and he gets activated, then I do think Congress can get this done because I also think they know
36:21 they've got one shot at it. 'Cause a lot of these things can only get done through this process. This arcane process known as reconciliation, but I mean, you've got a one-shot deal. And if you
36:30 can't do it in reconciliation, then you need a bipartisan majority to get it done. And that's gonna be really hard. So I'm more optimistic, but it will be a huge, huge challenge and it's going to
36:40 need presidential leadership. Yeah, the thing that worries me is, it's kind of like when you're making chili at home, You're just throwing everything into the chili. And so it's all who's
36:52 standing next to
36:56 the big pot throwing the ingredients in when the ingredients are getting thrown in. Yeah. You know, 'cause to your point, reconciliation. Can we get an exemption for energy from the Jones Act? I
37:09 mean, will that get thrown into the one big, beautiful bill, you know, who knows? Well, here's how we, here's how I think about it. You know, there's a durability question here too, right?
37:20 And there's a, how much can you get done through executive order? You can get some things done through executive order. But then if you lose the White House, you know, those things can be undone,
37:30 you know, in, you know, snap of fingers on day one. You can get some things done through regulatory policy and those are more durable, right? Those, those, you know, might take, you know,
37:40 be in place for years or maybe longer, but could also be undone with a change in administration. Legislation, is the most durable policy. And so if - And the way we should do it. And the way we
37:52 should do things, right? Via our elected representatives in Congress, exactly. And so if you're looking for to do durable policy and things like tax policy can only get done through legislation,
38:05 things like permitting reform can only get done through legislation - I mean, real permitting reform, right? You can issue permits, certainly. But real lasting permitting reform, you have to go
38:16 through Congress And so I think this president is really pushing the envelope in terms of how much he can get done using his executive authority. And I think the agencies will push the envelope in
38:28 terms of how much they can get done through agency action. But those will all be litigated. And so to really have durability and lasting reform, you need Congress to step in. Yeah. And I'm not
38:42 sure
38:45 on that one I mean, basically. You need 60 votes in the Senate. Except for reconciliation. Except for reconciliation. Except for reconciliation. So nothing's gonna get done outside of
38:55 reconciliation 'cause I mean, there's not anything that Trump would be for that the Democrats would be for. I would hope that permitting reform is something that could get done outside of
39:05 reconciliation. Reconciliation for super arcane reasons can't get done through reconciliation because it's not fiscal based. And so you have to do permitting reform on a bipartisan basis But here's
39:17 the thing. A lot of Democrats really want permitting reform. You know, there's sort of a term in DC. It's called pipes and wires. You need it to build pipelines, but you also need it to build
39:26 transmission lines. And so there's a grand bargain to be had on permitting reform for all sources of energy, for oil and gas and for renewable and for transmission. I mean, betterment votes for
39:39 that. Betterment votes for that. You got to find, you know, six, six stems
39:45 the Senate to vote for that and that's a challenge. But there's a handful, and again, there are
39:52 environmental democrat senators that want permitting reform and are willing to have discussions on what the oil and gas industry wants and what the renewable and transmission industry want that are
40:08 happening. It is hard, but I wouldn't take it off the table. At the end of the day, I hate to be up on my soapbox and be preachy and all this. If we seed AI to the rest of the world, we're so
40:26 fucked. Yeah, that's just horrible. It's essential. That's part of the reason that fossil fuels are part of the conversation, again, to be totally honest, because natural gas is so critical to
40:38 data centers and AI, and there's almost. I mean, there are other sources of energy for. data center certainly, but not ones that provide that base load power today. You know, nuclear, yes,
40:54 will be great years from now, right? But like the time it's going to take that to come online, you know, natural gas is the source that's here today to provide that reliable 247 energy, reliable,
41:06 affordable 247 energy. And if we lose that, if we, if we are unable to meet our AI ambitions because of a lack of energy resources, like that is a nightmare. I mean, this is in my mind, truly
41:22 Manhattan Project level stuff. I mean, AI could be that powerful. And if we let the Chinese and the Russians have it because we don't want to build a wire here because of the blunt nose leopard
41:34 losing, I mean, come on, folks Yeah. And I think that that is actually a concept that you can get some bipartisan support around in Washington right now. Now, you know, there's, you know,
41:47 There's a long ways to go, but that concept is really breaking through. And this administration, to be fair, is putting a huge premium on AI and what do we need to do to remove the barriers to
41:59 ensure that AI can thrive here and that data centers can be built and that they can be powered by a made-of-americ energy. Yeah. I've been joking on the podcast that if I'm the mayor of MonaHands,
42:12 which is a small town out in West Texas, I'm upgrading that, Ben, again
42:18 I can have Silicon Valley come through and give Zuckerberg the Mona Christos sandwich that Ben again is so famous for, but yeah, we've got to do that. So any good gossip from Sarah Week? Gossip
42:35 from Sarah Week. Let's see. So Chris Wright kicked us off and it was just a 180 in tone in terms of what we've heard from Sarah Week in the past.
42:57 Secretary Granholm always came to see her week and we always appreciated her coming. But one year, I think she told the oil and gas industry that they were like Kodak. Yeah, learn the code. Y'all
42:60 need to learn the code. And what we heard from Secretary Wright was just a really robust defense of the industry, led with the importance of natural gas, talked a lot about nuclear, talked about,
43:12 so very much in all of the above, but just as you know, and as your folks know, like he's just, the industry has almost no better, more eloquent, defender of the importance of made in America
43:26 energy. And so it was just a great way to kick off the week. Secretary Bergum is here. You know, he's here both in his capacity as Secretary of the Interior, but also as co-chair of the National
43:39 Energy Dominance Council, which he's co-chairing with Wright, which is a council that sits within the White House to.
43:45 tackle some of these issues that we're talking about related to AI and permitting and ensuring that we have the energy that we need to meet growing demand. And so, you know, he's talking a lot
43:56 about, you know, if you have problems with getting permits, please let me know personally, I want to help, right? And so, again, it's just, it's just a real 180 in tone, where, you know,
44:08 industry isn't sort of, again, justifying their existence. They are
44:15 being thanked for their service to the country. And, you know, I think that that I know, I know, right? Yeah, that's been great. You know, tariffs are also a topic, right? You know, that's,
44:27 you know, something that, you know, I think most of industry does have some heartburn over. And so that's, that's a topic that's, you know, also being discussed in some of the, in some of the
44:37 rooms as well. Yeah, I mean, you know, if we have three months, It's six months of upheaval on that front, but we get better trade deals, okay. And I just wish we were using the scalpel there.
44:50 I think the scalpel would be a much better approach. And then I think the amount of uncertainty that it's creating by they're on, they're off, they're on, they're off is unhelpful. I think having
45:02 clearer objectives as to what is trying to be accomplished, you know, through there's, you know, there's a myriad of tariffs, right? There's the North American tariffs, they're just dealing
45:12 aluminum tariffs, you know, so it's been a bit of a moving target in terms of what are we trying to accomplish with each of these tariffs and are they temporary, are they here to stay? It's
45:24 something that I think a lot of folks are looking for clarity on. Yeah, 'cause I mean, this was a market that was looking for a reason to crash. I mean, when you had, when you're at all-time
45:34 highs on sales, sales
45:40 market value to sales multiples. market value to earnings type multiples. It's looking for a reason to crash and we kind of handed it to them with the tariff stuff. So anyway. Yeah, so I would
45:55 echo your hope that this settles out in the next few months, hopefully. So is the AXPC need from the world to help? Gosh, well, first, I mean I am so privileged to represent the industry in
46:10 Washington I'm so grateful for what, you know, that - You're cool again, too. I know, I know, my phone is ringing again. I'm so grateful for what the energy industry does for America and for
46:22 the world. So I love representing this industry in Washington. I think continuing to tell our story, right? That's sort of a vague notion that we talk about a lot, but it's so important. We were
46:36 just talking in the way here about,
46:39 the both in land man, which we've talked about and I love, but my organization did a little video from a Pennsylvania farmer talking about what the oil and gas industry has meant for the farming
46:50 industry in Pennsylvania. They can buy new equipment, they can go on vacations and their kids to college. And I think those sort of ancillary stories of the benefit that this industry provides to
47:02 communities around the country is so, so important. Well, one deal is every one of us has this Yep, yep. You know, and pro tip, if you want to put it on YouTube, you turn your camera lamp,
47:15 because those are the dimensions. But I mean, even stuff as simple as documentation is so helpful to the industry. You spill oil, but you show how you pick it up. Hey, this is how we cleaned it
47:26 up and this is how we dig the dirt and this is what we do. Yeah. Put that on Facebook. Even if it gets five likes, that's five more likes than we had yesterday. Yeah.
47:37 based on the industry is so incredibly important. And you all are so good at that because you know, Not this way. Yeah, anyway. You know, big oil, you know, quote unquote, has been really
47:51 demagogued for a long time and demonized to some extent. And it's an easy concept to demonize, but it's a lot harder when you put human faces behind the workers that are out in the field doing the
48:02 hard work to provide Americans, you know, the energy that they use every day So Grandma doesn't freeze during the winter so that the lights come on and - Yeah, so putting that human face on the
48:15 industry, I think is critical. And, you know, we can certainly help amplify. I know you help amplify. We love to tell those stories because it really does make a huge difference. There you go.
48:26 You heard it from the source. Well, you were cool to come on. I appreciate it. Yeah, happy to be here. I'm very curious. Yeah, standing in by it any time. Cool. That being said, I still
48:36 want to come to DC and like hang out in the doge room. Can you make that happen? Well, you come to DC, we'll set up some meetings for you. That's perfect. Yeah, yeah, let me know, let me know.
48:47 Have you been to DC? I have been to DC. When's the last time you were there? I went right before COVID. So you know how we know? It was Anthony Rendon's last year with the Nationals before he
49:00 signed the big deal with the Angels. I don't know when that was I don't know when that was either, but I think it was, I think it was right before COVID because, so Anthony played baseball at Rice,
49:11 dear friend.
49:15 And anyway, so he was really cool 'cause he got seats for me and my daughters. It took us backstage, went through the locker room, you know, all that good stuff. But we did it all. We did the
49:28 Washington Monument. We did the Smithsonian, all that good stuff.
49:33 Yeah, let me know when you're coming we'll set you will all get some meetings for you. There we go. Yeah, perfect folks. Yeah, maybe doge, maybe not