Donald Trump has, of course, promised to cut energy prices by half as the centerpiece of his policy to combat inflation across the board. And the refrain that we heard in Milwaukee, much like it was in the Twin Cities in two thousand and eight, was drill, Baby, Drill. Now on the other end of these promises, at least in some cases, is the governor of Alaska, and I'm glad to say that he's in Washington today. He came here to warm up in our twenty five degree whether Governor
Mike Dunlavy. It's great to see you in the nation's capitol. Welcome back. Great to be here at a start of Indian radio on a summer day with I think it was twenty seven. I'll be fair here. I want to know what your state is going to look like a year or four from now. Knowing that Donald Trump has talked a lot about not only unwinding regulations, but unwinding limits on drilling in your state, specifically in anwar, how quickly will you get to this and what changes in the offing.
It's a great question, Joe. So it depends on the executive orders. Some have said that the President's dropping secret orders immediately, maybe even on the first day. Hopefully some of those executive orders will repeal. With some of the Biden administration folks have done to Alaska, our Senator Dan Sullivan has an interesting chart that shows about sixty six sanctions against Alaska is what we call them, since the
Biden administrations came into play. So, for example, in twenty seventeen, an war was open under the Tax and Jobs Bill, and the Biden administration has really done everything they can to stop those leases from actually going into play. We're supposed to have a sale again, a second sale for leases in an war in December. We're not sure if that's even going to happen. This is required by law,
but we'll see when December comes along. But we were questioning whether this administration is going to go through with that. But I would say what Alaska's going to look like is what it's supposed to look like. What this country's supposed to look like is tremendous opportunity under the Trump administration, just like his first term, great conversations with the President during his first term, he always asked this, what does
Alaska need? What can we do for Alaska? And under President Trump, we got anwar, we were drilling more, we were moving Western NPR, which is the National Patrolling Reserve, about twenty seven million acres of land in Alaska that was designated solely for oil production and gas production. Very supportively is of our gas line project that is fully permitted that we're trying to finalize. Timber industry. Timber industry disappeared in the longest National forest under the Clinton administration.
Hopefully that comes back. But between oil, gas mining, timber, we have tremendous opportunity in Alaska. All we want is the opportunity to be able to develop those resources on federal land, and we're very hopeful with President Trump coming back.
You mentioned the leases under the Biden administration. Seven of them that had been acquired by the Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority were canceled and two others were abandoned. As a result, You're in an interesting position here as a policymaker, with one hand on Washington the other on industry. There's been a bit of a lucy with the football. According to some producers, K want assurances before they start investing in these leases. What would you tell them, Well.
That's that's another thing. That the Trump administration will bring a certainty. So part of the problem with the leases in anwar as you as you mentioned is when you're selling leases, but on the other hand, you're telling folks to not invest in the Arctic, to not put money in the Arctic, to not put money into oil. You know, it provides an uncertain future for those investors, and so I think under the Trump administration that's going to change.
The other thing that's very important, you know, realize, is we're going to need two to three times as much energy as we're producing right now because of data farms, supercomputers. That's rapidly changing that. You know, a gig a gigawat of electricity powers about eight hundred thousand homes. We only have seven hundred thousand people in the state of Alaska, so some of these data farms are using more than
the power we generate for all of our residents. You're going to have to have as much energy as possible coming from various sources, and we're gonna need it. Sider then later you're.
Sitting on oil. But a lot of people are talking about nuclear Now do you support that?
Yeah, we support all forms of energy, doesn't matter if it's renewables, oil gas, nukes, any and all forms of energy. And we actually passed a new exciting bill two years ago that's going to make it easier for nuclear office to come up and take a look at a lot.
Is that right? So Alaska could be the home of the new nuclear reactor in the United States?
Well, I hope so. And we're also looking at a nuclear reactor on one of our military bases at Ailson. So yes, we hope. So, you need as much energy as possible, again, from any source we can get it from.
Or will we see an auction in the early stages of the Trump administration when it comes to these leases, or do you not have a sensing exactly so that procedure will.
Be I hope so. And I hope that also pertains the offshore oral leases, which were also negatively impacted by the Biden administration. So onshore, offshore again, we hope that there's a couple of resales, like well, pretty quick.
The prize for you, unless you tell me otherwise, is a pipeline, a natural gas pipeline that the Trump administration has promise. You actually retweeted a statement by Donald Trump on this what's your expectation.
What has he told you? Well, we have all the permits for this pipeline. It's a massive pipeline project where I think we're battling our last court case. So this this pipeline project is really coming together with buyers and sellers of gas. The President has been very consistent. President Trump's are very consistent, and he supports this gas line constant.
What people don't realize is Alaska pioneered energy export for North America in late nineteen sixty sixty eight sixty nine, we sent gas to Japan energy out of the Kiski, Alaska, which is south of Anchorage. That occurred for fifty years until our gas got depleted in the cook Inlet. But we're talking about North Slope gas, which is one hundred trillion qb feet to two hundred trillion qubic feet of gas.
Tremendous amounts of gas. But we're very close to consummating this gas pipeline and I'm pretty excited about it.
Well, Chris Wright and Doug Bergham Howlpe, you make that happen.
Well, I know Doug, Doug's a former governor, comes from an energy state. I think I don't rightwell, but from what I understand, he's going to do a great job as well. But Doug is going to be terrific because it's that interface between technology, supercomputing and energy, and his role as the energies Are, I think is going to pay amazing diffidence.
For this country energies are, but also the Interior Secretary. He might have something to say about the lands we're talking about.
Yeah, we have more of more blm lands, more parklands than any other state in the country in terms of acreage. Our population has more Native Americans than any of any other state as a percentage, twenty percent of our population as Native American. And so a lot to do with the Apartment of Interior Alaska has. And so we look forward to working with Doug on solving some problems for the state and the country.
The biggest tribe in Alaska supports your move.
On energy, most most Native Alaskans, most Alaskans support our moves on energy.
This is something that's been mischaracterized Absolutelydia.
How come because it doesn't play to the narrative on the left, My wife is an you pack Eskimo, my kids are Eskimo. Their tribal members and their members of our native corporations up there. My three girls work at the largest legending mine in the world. It's the resource extraction industry. Most Native Americans, they're Americans. They want to be able to turn their lights on, they want to be able to warm their homes. They want to be able to drive their machines, their cars or snow machines,
whatever it is. And so, yeah, energy is important to all of us.
They also want to drink clean water and breathe clean air. Do you worry about the impact on climate change that, for instance, the LNG exports is lifting that moratorium looks like a day one endeavor for Donald Troy.
I hope so, And I don't because Alaska takes care of this environment probably better than any other place in the country. And excuse me, any other place in the world, and probably any other place in the country. When you shift your resource development overseas, the places like China, places in Africa, the Middle East, they don't have the environmental regulations that we do. And so by doing it here in America, you get the benefits of taking care of
the environment, jobs, wealth creation, and really opportunity. And this energy is really going to be the underpinnings for the supercomputing age, the AI age that we need to be leaders.
You've got your eyes on data center. Absolutely, that's a big deal for Alaska. Or does the distance make it difficult to put the data centers themselves in Alaska? Or is it about procuring energy in Alaska that will feed the data centers here?
Well, what we have going for is in Alaska's energy. Yeah, we have continuous acres of land. Any large tracks of lander have that. We have three times the fresh water of any other state.
So set up the farms in Alaska and we have cool temperatures there you go. Absolutely, cooling is a big part of this. That's fascinating. I want to talk about you, governor and your personal trajectory because a lot of people are watching us right now. Joe's talking to the governor of Alaska. Is this big timberman looking guy's logging. You're from Scranton, Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania, and after you graduated from college, after spending a life hunting and fishing and being outdoors,
you decided to just move your life to Alaska. Through a connection, you got a job as a logger as a kid from Scranton, which more people associate with Joe Biden than with Mike Dunlavy. What was the scratch or the itch you were trying to by making that move?
Always loved the outdoors and the ultimate outdoor.
Was it culture shock when you got there?
Not really? Great people in Alaska just like great people in Sprant So not really. But it was the outdoors, the willderness that drew me there back in nineteen eighty three, so right out of college, went to Alaska.
I never looked back, never looked back. How much time did you spend logging?
Well, that was what learn doing this several months in southeast Alaska. Then I moved up north close to the Arctic Circle, and I was a teacher for over a twenty two years.
You were a teacher for a long time before you got into politics. What did you learn as a logger from Scranton, Pennsylvania.
That jobs are incredibly important, especially for low income folks, opportunities very important, and resource development is what Alaska is all about. That's why the US acquired Alaska from Russia was resource development. And again we do it better than anywhere else I think in the world.
You then became a teacher, Yes, do you think that Donald Trump is on the right track to eliminate the Department of Education. As an educator yourself, I.
Do because education was one of those rights that the States never gave up in the Constitution where we formed the federal government, because the states believe that their control of education was critically important, not the federal government's control. And so the Department of Education as a new department came in under Jimmy Carter and a number of us that were teachers, administrators, school board members, which I was
as well. We think you can do things better at the local level than you can thousands of miles away from Alaska, thousands of miles away from other states, and so certainly support the elimination, if possible, of the Department of Education.
What do you do for funding for disabled students some of the other expenses that might be hard for.
Us to run that money through health social services. There's many ways to get money to certain groups in the educational umbrella. It doesn't have to be through this department that currently exists.
A lot of people suggested you for a number of jobs here in Washington. I heard that, Yeah, you might have as well. You're here right now. I don't know if who you're talking to, would you consider working for this administration? Maybe you should run the Department of Education.
Well, I think he's already got a great pick and we McMahon for education. But the President I never talked about a job. He knows that I have two years left in my term. I barely enjoyed this job, and as mentioned earlier, we're on the verge of some big projects that we want to make sure you get across the finish line. So I've got my hands filled over the next two years with the.
Last Sure did a lot of governors though, say that The stock answer is, oh my god, Washington, nothing gets done there. I'm better off here. I'm an executive running my own state right where I want to be.
Truth to that too?
Is there truth to that? Does anything get done in Washington? With Donald Trump? At the other end of I.
Think with President Trump, he really wants to change things. He really wants to disrupt things. And I say that in the positive. He really wants to give power back to the states, give power back to the people. So I'm excited about the possibilities. I saw what he did this first term, and he said four years the plan for this term. I think it's going to be a great four years for this country.
Can he really drop energy prices by fifty percent.
If we produce more?
Yeah, if you produce more, that's what we're talking about.
Yes. And for a last what we want to have is more production. Not necessarily higher prices because higher prices hurt Americans start Alaska's but more production. That's where we'll get revenue from as well. More production.
Nice to see you in town. Come see us again. The governor of Alaska, Mike Dunlavy. Now you know where he's from.