Biden nominee pushing electric vehicles faces massive opposition from energy industry

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FIRST ON FOX: A large coalition of 43 of the most influential oil and gas industry trade groups are opposing President Biden's nominee to lead a Department of Transportation safety subagency.

The coalition — led by the Western Energy Alliance and joined by the American Petroleum Institute and National Ocean Industries Association among others — penned a letter Wednesday to Senate leaders, announcing their adamant opposition to Ann Carlson's nomination to lead the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). 

The groups argued that Carlson's past statements suggest she is willing to skirt the agency's mission and implement far-reaching climate policies to promote electric vehicles (EV). Congress established NHTSA in 1970 to improve the safety of passenger cars amid a surge in traffic accidents and deaths.

"[Carlson's] multiple public statements reveal a clear agenda to go beyond NHTSA’s congressionally mandated mission on vehicle performance and safety standards and turn it into a climate change enforcement body," the coalition wrote. "We are also concerned by Carlson’s lack of transparency about her work promoting spurious climate change litigation."

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President Biden nominated Ann Carlson to lead the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration in February. (Ting Shen/Bloomberg via Getty Images | National Highway Traffic Safety Administration)

"Today, the most pressing concern of NHTSA is not climate change impacts decades into the future but traffic safety in the here and now," the letter continued. "Americans face real dangers from distracted and impaired drivers behind the wheel and potential vehicle safety standard violations."

Fox News Digital reported in April that Carlson privately boasted in 2021 emails obtained by a watchdog group that she was recruited by the administration to oversee climate standards for cars and trucks. 

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She noted in the emails that NHTSA is "in charge of climate standards for cars," that she was among the first "NHTSA appointees ever with serious climate expertise," and that her appointment proved the Biden administration would be "really serious about their climate goals."

"I view my appointment (and a number of others) as evidence that the Biden Administration is truly committed to a 'whole of government' approach to addressing climate change," Carlson wrote in a Jan. 21 email reviewed by Fox News Digital.

NHTSA acting Administrator Ann Carlson informs UCLA Law colleagues on Jan. 18, 2021, that she was appointed to serve in the Biden administration. (Government Accountability & Oversight)

At the time, the Biden-Harris transition team hired Carlson, who was an environmental law professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, to serve as NHTSA's chief counsel, the emails showed. While the position didn't require Senate confirmation, Carlson has overseen key agency initiatives like the modification of fuel economy standards and has served as acting administrator since September.

The Western Energy Alliance-led coalition wrote that NHTSA's administrator should be "focused on saving lives and mitigating harm, not reorienting the agency to engage in a whole-of-government approach to climate change."

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"She's on a mission to ban the internal combustion engine," Western Energy Alliance President Kathleen Sgamma told Fox News Digital in an interview. "It's pretty clear she wants to use NHTSA's regulatory powers to do something that Congress didn't give her the power to do. And that is to force drivers into electric vehicles."

"She's just not appropriate for the job," Sgamma continued. "She has a climate change agenda and she has conflicts of interest. She's just not at all concerned with highway safety. She is concerned with getting Americans out of the vehicles that they want to drive and forcing them into EVs."

Senate Commerce Committee Ranking Member Ted Cruz, R-Texas, wrote a scathing letter to Carlson this week, expressing concern over the Biden administration's electric vehicle push. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

The letter Wednesday was addressed to Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee Chairwoman Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., and Ranking Member Ted Cruz, R-Texas. The committee is tasked with overseeing her nomination.

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But Cruz led a letter signed by every Republican committee member to Carlson on Monday, expressing their concern about the Biden administration's aggressive EV push. The letter was first reported by The Hill.

President Biden nominated Carlson, an environmental law expert, for NHTSA administrator in February. The Senate Commerce Committee received the nomination from the White House on March 27.

The White House didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.