During a visit to the Perminan Basin in Texas on July 29, President Donald Trump said he has defended oil interests in the region, called Democrats far-left extremists and referring to the COVID-19 virus as the “China virus,” a "Chinese plague" and an invisible enemy.
“Together, we will end this plague (virus) from China,” Trump said, according to a transcript on Whitehouse.gov.
The Permian Basin is a region in west Texas and the southeastern part of New Mexico including the towns of Lubbock and Midland whose sedimentary rock has made it one of the country’s richest areas for oil and natural gas production.
Speaking from the Double Eagle oil facility in Midland, Trump told workers and onlookers that since his election, he has doubled oil and energy production in the Perminan Basin, making the U.S. the world’s top producer. He said he had created 800,000 new energy-related jobs, a third of them in Texas, and at the same time the country has the cleanest air and water on earth.
“We really did a great job,” Trump said.
Trump thanked Saudi Arabia and Russia for helping stabilize oil prices worldwide and for helping to save the Texas oil industry.
“When oil crashed, I got Saudi Arabia and Russia and others to cut nearly 10 million barrels a day and got OPEC and Mexico to agree to the deal,” he explained.
On COVID-19, Trump said the antiviral drug “remdesivir” is being used with great success and that use of protective equipment has been expanded at nursing homes to protect senior citizens.
“Under my administration’s Operation Warp Speed, we’re developing vaccines in record time,” Trump said to applause. “Earlier this week, a promising vaccine entered the final stage of clinical trials, long ahead of schedule, with more following very quickly behind. We have some of the greatest companies, labs in the world doing this. This is the fastest a vaccine has ever been developed.”
Trump said the Payroll Protection Program had provided $1 billion to help keep Texas energy producers employed and added that far-left opponents he described as a “mob” would destroy not only the Texas oil industry, but the entire U.S. economy if they ever gained power.
"The policies required to implement this extreme agenda would mean the death of American prosperity and the end of the American middle class,” Trump said.
Trump thanked Texas Republican members of Congress including Senator Ted Cruz who he described as a “great friend,” Gov. Greg Abbott who Trump said was doing a “fantastic job,” and Energy Secretary Dan Brouillette.
In a reference to unrest and riots caused by the killing of George Floyd by police in Minneapolis last May, Trump cited radical lawless agitators in Portland.
“Look at the anarchists in Portland," Trump said, "and our people have done a great job in protecting our courthouse. I told my people, a little while ago: If they don’t solve that problem locally, very soon, we’re going to send in the National Guard and get it solved very quickly, just like we did in Minneapolis and just like we will do in other places.”
Spectators applauded.
“They want to solve their problem,” Trump added. “They’ve got a very short time to do it. But they’ll either solve their problem or we send in the National Guard.”