President-elect Donald Trump announced Thursday that he has chosen billionaire North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, a close ally of the fossil fuel industry and vocal proponent of oil drilling, to serve as head of the Interior Department in the incoming administration, a critical post tasked with overseeing hundreds of millions of acres of federal land and water.
Burgum, a friend of oil billionaire Harold Hamm, served as a kind of middleman between Trump’s presidential campaign and the fossil fuel industry during the 2024 race. The Washington Post reported that Burgum’s selection as interior secretary will “give Hamm expansive influence over policy related to drilling on public lands, at a time his company stands to benefit from the rule changes Trump envisions.”
Burgum and Hamm have already worked to shape Trump’s energy policy during the presidential transition, with Reuters reporting Thursday that the pair is leading the push for a repeal of electric vehicle tax credits — a key component of the Biden administration’s signature climate law, the Inflation Reduction Act.
During a fundraiser over the summer, Burgum said Trump could “on day one” move to unleash “liquid fuels,” accusing the Biden administration of waging war on “American energy.”
“Whether it’s baseload electricity, whether it’s oil, whether it’s gas, whether it’s ethanol, there is an attack on liquid fuels,” Burgum declared.
Trump campaigned on a pledge to “drill, baby, drill” in the face of a fossil fuel-driven climate emergency that is wreaking deadly havoc in the United States and around the world. While the Biden administration has presided over record oil and gas production and approved many new drilling permits to the dismay of climate advocates, Trump has made clear that he intends to take a sledgehammer to any guardrails constraining the fossil fuel industry.
In Burgum, Trump will have an enthusiastic champion of oil and gas drilling in a Cabinet that is shaping up to be a boon for the fossil fuel industry. Burgum helped organize the dinner at which Trump urged the oil and gas industry to raise $1 billion for his campaign in exchange for tax breaks and large-scale deregulation.
“We’re going do things with energy and with land — Interior — that is going to be incredible,” Trump said late Thursday.
Kierán Suckling, executive director of the Center for Biological Diversity, said in a statement that “Burgum is an oligarch completely out of touch with the overwhelming majority of Americans who cherish our natural heritage and don’t want our parks, wildlife refuges, and other special places carved up and destroyed.”
“We’re ready to fight Burgum and Trump’s extreme agenda every step of the way,” Suckling added.
In his current capacity as North Dakota governor, Burgum is pushing a 2,000-mile carbon pipeline project set to be built by Summit Carbon Solutions with the stated goal of capturing planet-warming CO2 and storing it underground. Climate advocates have long derided carbon capture and storage — a method boosted by the fossil fuel industry — as a dangerous scam that can actually result in more emissions.
The Associated Press reported earlier this year that “the blowback in North Dakota to the Summit project has been intense with Burgum caught in the crossfire.”
“There are fears a pipeline rupture would unleash a lethal cloud of CO2,” the outlet noted. “Landowners worry their property values will plummet if the pipeline passes under their land.”
The North Dakota Public Service Commission is planning to meet Friday to vote on the project.
Help us Prepare for Trump’s Day One
Trump is busy getting ready for Day One of his presidency – but so is Truthout.
Trump has made it no secret that he is planning a demolition-style attack on both specific communities and democracy as a whole, beginning on his first day in office. With over 25 executive orders and directives queued up for January 20, he’s promised to “launch the largest deportation program in American history,” roll back anti-discrimination protections for transgender students, and implement a “drill, drill, drill” approach to ramp up oil and gas extraction.
Organizations like Truthout are also being threatened by legislation like HR 9495, the “nonprofit killer bill” that would allow the Treasury Secretary to declare any nonprofit a “terrorist-supporting organization” and strip its tax-exempt status without due process. Progressive media like Truthout that has courageously focused on reporting on Israel’s genocide in Gaza are in the bill’s crosshairs.
As journalists, we have a responsibility to look at hard realities and communicate them to you. We hope that you, like us, can use this information to prepare for what’s to come.
And if you feel uncertain about what to do in the face of a second Trump administration, we invite you to be an indispensable part of Truthout’s preparations.
In addition to covering the widespread onslaught of draconian policy, we’re shoring up our resources for what might come next for progressive media: bad-faith lawsuits from far-right ghouls, legislation that seeks to strip us of our ability to receive tax-deductible donations, and further throttling of our reach on social media platforms owned by Trump’s sycophants.
We’re preparing right now for Trump’s Day One: building a brave coalition of movement media; reaching out to the activists, academics, and thinkers we trust to shine a light on the inner workings of authoritarianism; and planning to use journalism as a tool to equip movements to protect the people, lands, and principles most vulnerable to Trump’s destruction.
We urgently need your help to prepare. As you know, our December fundraiser is our most important of the year and will determine the scale of work we’ll be able to do in 2025. We’ve set two goals: to raise $125,000 in one-time donations and to add 1400 new monthly donors by midnight on December 31.
Today, we’re asking all of our readers to start a monthly donation or make a one-time donation – as a commitment to stand with us on day one of Trump’s presidency, and every day after that, as we produce journalism that combats authoritarianism, censorship, injustice, and misinformation. You’re an essential part of our future – please join the movement by making a tax-deductible donation today.
If you have the means to make a substantial gift, please dig deep during this critical time!
With gratitude and resolve,
Maya, Negin, Saima, and Ziggy