Trump administration reverses course, pulls Florida’s coast from oil drill expansion

A meeting between U.S. Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke and Gov. Rick Scott in Tallahassee on Tuesday evening led to the removal of the coastal waters of Florida from consideration for offshore oil drilling expansion.

On Jan. 4, Zinke announced that parts of the eastern Gulf of Mexico, along with the Atlantic, Pacific and Arctic, were part of a draft proposal to expand offshore oil drilling expeditions in the form of 47 new leases. The U.S. Department of the Interior also is considering rolling back regulations that were put in place after the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill.

Scott said he had requested to meet with the interior secretary last week. The two met at Tallahassee International Airport at 5:45 p.m., 15 minutes after the State of the State reception was scheduled to start.

“By removing Florida from consideration, we can now focus on how we can further protect our environment, including our proposal for record funding for the Everglades, our springs, our beaches and our state parks,” Scott said in a statement. “I will never stop fighting for Florida’s environment and our pristine coastline.”

Zinke said in a statement that President Donald Trump had directed his department to reinstall the oil and gas program “in a manner that supports national energy policy and also takes into consideration the local and state voice.”

“I have had the honor to witness Governor Scott’s leadership through hurricane season and am working closely with him on Everglades restoration,” Zinke said in a statement. “He is straightforward and a leader that can be trusted.”

Zinke said part of his consideration in the decision was Florida’s reliance on tourism for economic development.

U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., who was one of 37 senators to pen a letter to Zinke urging him to not expand oil exploration, was critical of the way the move played out.

“I have spent my entire life fighting to keep oil rigs away from our coasts. But now, suddenly, Secretary Zinke announces plans to drill off Florida’s coast and four days later agrees to ‘take Florida off the table?’ I don’t believe it,” Nelson said in a statement. “This is a political stunt orchestrated by the Trump administration to help Rick Scott, who has wanted to drill off Florida’s coast his entire career. We shouldn’t be playing politics with the future of Florida.”

While the Senate’s version of the letter focused on the expansion as a whole, the House’s version of the letter discussed some of the cutbacks on regulations, which include “(reversing) a rule that called for more frequent testing of blowout preventers — the same device that failed in the Deepwater Horizon spill, which is intended to serve as a fail-safe against explosions in undersea oil and gas wells” and no longer require investigations into equipment failure be completed within 120 days, the letter read.

The Deepwater Horizon explosion killed 11 people and subsquently released 210 million gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. After that, a moratorium on drilling in the body of water was put in place and expires in 2022.

U.S. Rep. Vern Buchanan, R-Longboat Key, who previously called the move to expand oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico “reckless,” was among the representatives who signed the the letter to Zinke.

“Great news: Trump administration has canceled plans to drill off Florida’s coastline,” Buchanan tweeted. “Kudos to Governor Scott and Florida’s congressional delegation for strongly protesting the initial plan to expand drilling.”

This story was originally published January 9, 2018 at 8:36 PM with the headline "Trump administration reverses course, pulls Florida’s coast from oil drill expansion."