An energy sector expert and current congressional candidate accused White House spokesperson Jen Psaki of deliberately attempting to mislead the public during an exchange with a report last week. Republican candidate Jan Kulmann, who worked within the energy sector for over two decades, said Psaki used “misdirection” after she boosted the nation’s “9,000 unused permits” for drilling.

The Daily Wire reports:

PSAKI: I don’t have anything planned on the schedule for that front. But I will tell you that the President has been clear that he believes they have the tools they need — 9,000 unused permits. They have the capacity they need to go get more oil here in the United States, and he’d encourage them to do that.

“In the course of defending the Biden administration’s refusal to issue new oil and gas leases on federal land, Psaki said that there are over 9,000 unused leases already. So, why issue new ones?” Kulmann wrote at the Washington Examiner. 

Kulmann noted that without years of first-hand experience within the energy sector Psaki’s claims would easily slip by many and sound plausible.

“An existing lease means nothing if you cannot get surface agreements in place or pipelines close by enough to move the oil and gas,” the Republican said. “A new lease may be more promising for short-term production than an existing lease. But whenever this issue comes up, Democrats try to make it sound like companies are just sitting on permits, irrationally doing nothing, and therefore no new ones ought to be issued.”

“In short, this is misdirection — a deliberate effort to mislead the public with a falsehood that sounds plausible,” Kulmann ripped Psaki.

Last month the administration announced it was halting new oil and gas leases indefinitely.

U.S. crude oil hit a 13-year high of $130 earlier this month, CNBC News reported: “West Texas Intermediate crude futures, the U.S. oil benchmark, at one point spiked to $130.50 [March 6], its highest since July 2008, before retreating.”