Congress is taking back control of energy policy from the White House. The House passed legislation in February that requires congressional approval before any president can ban hydraulic fracturing on federal lands, a direct response to Joe Biden’s eleventh hour decision to lock up 625 million acres of ocean from oil drilling.
The 226 to 188 vote on February 7 puts the issue squarely in the Senate’s hands and raises a bigger question: Can presidents permanently ban drilling on public lands, or does that power belong to Congress?
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Biden Locked Down the Coasts on His Way Out
Two weeks before Donald Trump took office, Biden signed presidential memoranda closing off most U.S. coastal waters to future oil and gas leasing. The January 6 action covered the entire East Coast, the eastern Gulf of Mexico, West Coast waters, and parts of Alaska’s Arctic Ocean.
Biden used Section 12(a) of the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act, a 1953 law that lets presidents withdraw unleased federal waters from mineral development “from time to time.” His administration says the withdrawals are permanent with no expiration date.
The timing mattered. Biden knew Trump planned to expand offshore drilling and wanted to make reversal as difficult as possible.
The Legal Problem Nobody Can Solve
Trump signed an executive order on January 20 reversing Biden’s protections. He also tried to reopen Arctic areas that Obama had protected.
But here’s where it gets complicated. The law doesn’t say presidents can undo what previous presidents withdrew. It only authorizes withdrawals, not reversals.
This already went to court once. In 2019, Judge Sharon Gleason in Alaska ruled that Trump couldn’t reverse Obama’s Arctic protections because the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act doesn’t grant that authority. Only Congress can restore withdrawn lands to leasing, she wrote.
Trump’s team appealed to the 9th Circuit, but Biden took office before the appeals court could rule. Biden immediately revoked Trump’s order, making the case moot.
No federal appeals court has ever decided whether a president can reverse a predecessor’s drilling ban.
Environmental Groups and Industry Go to Court Again
The same legal fight is happening now. Environmental groups including Earthjustice, Sierra Club, Oceana, and the Center for Biological Diversity filed suit in February challenging Trump’s authority to reverse the protections.
Five Republican state attorneys general took the opposite approach, suing alongside the American Petroleum Institute and Gulf Energy Alliance to overturn Biden’s ban.
Federal courts are expected to rule in 2026, possibly before the Interior Department holds a planned lease sale in Alaska’s Beaufort Sea.
Congress Writes Its Own Rules
The House isn’t waiting for courts to decide. H.R. 26, the Protecting American Energy Production Act, changes the rules going forward. Rep. August Pfluger, a Texas Republican, sponsored the bill to prevent any president from declaring a moratorium on fracking without congressional authorization.
Sixteen Democrats joined all Republicans in passing it. The bill now sits in the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.
Fracking transformed American energy production. The technique accounts for two thirds of U.S. natural gas output and half of oil production. It made the United States the world’s largest natural gas exporter.
Key provisions of H.R. 26:
- Prohibits presidential fracking bans without congressional approval
- Affirms that states control fracking regulations on state and private lands
- Applies to oil, natural gas, and geothermal operations
The Senate would need seven Democrats to vote yes for passage, assuming all Republicans support it.
A Second Bill Goes Further
Rep. Clay Higgins of Louisiana introduced H.R. 513, the Offshore Lands Authorities Act, on January 16. This bill takes a harder line.
It would nullify all eight offshore withdrawals made by Biden and Obama, totaling hundreds of millions of acres. Beyond that, it rewrites presidential authority over offshore lands.
H.R. 513 would:
- Cancel Biden’s 625 million acre withdrawal and earlier Obama protections
- Cap future presidential withdrawals at under 100,000 acres
- Require congressional approval for cumulative withdrawals exceeding 500,000 acres
- Set a 20 year limit on all future withdrawals
- Mandate geological, economic, and national security assessments before any withdrawal
The House Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources held a hearing on the bill May 20. The Interior Department testified in support, saying it wants to restore access to areas withdrawn from energy development.
What Biden Actually Banned
Biden’s withdrawals sound massive, but the practical impact on current production is limited. He specifically exempted the Western and Central Gulf of Mexico, where 2,193 of the Gulf’s 2,206 active leases operate. Those two zones account for 97% of all offshore oil and gas production nationwide.
The eastern Gulf, Atlantic, Pacific, and Alaska areas covered by the ban hold significant untapped reserves but have no active production. Industry had been locked out of most of these areas for decades through various moratoria and restrictions.
Trump himself extended a moratorium on eastern Gulf drilling during his first term, issuing a memorandum in September 2020 that prohibited leasing there through June 2032.
Both Sides Claim the Law
Republicans argue the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act’s phrase “from time to time” implies temporary withdrawals, not permanent ones. If a president can withdraw lands temporarily, they say the power to reverse those withdrawals must be implied.
The Heritage Foundation and other conservative legal groups point to the Supreme Court’s “major questions doctrine.” The court has ruled that Congress must speak clearly before agencies or presidents can claim authority over major economic decisions. The Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act may be too vague to support permanent bans that transform energy policy, they argue.
Environmental groups counter that congressional silence on reversal authority was deliberate. Previous public lands laws explicitly granted reversal power when Congress intended it. The absence of that language in the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act means presidents can’t reverse withdrawals.
Nearly 400 municipalities and over 2,300 elected officials from coastal areas oppose expanding offshore drilling. Governors from both parties on the East and West coasts have raised concerns about opening their coastlines to new leasing.
Courts or Congress Will Decide
The question comes down to this: Does the 1953 Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act give presidents the power to permanently ban offshore drilling across hundreds of millions of acres? And if one president can make that call, can the next president reverse it?
Federal judges will answer those questions in 2026, but Congress is already writing new rules. Whether H.R. 26 or H.R. 513 becomes law depends on Senate votes and whether Trump would sign legislation limiting his own authority over drilling bans.
The House has made its position clear. Future presidential drilling bans need congressional approval, or they won’t stand.
