I’m with Nikki. Oil drilling rigs are beautiful. She is right about Joe Biden demonizing American energy. He said when he (barely) campaigned in 2019 and 2020 that he would put a stop to producing fossil fuels and he’s done all he can to keep his word on that. His stubborn short-sightedness and appeasement to the far-left environmental whackos has ended America’s energy independence that bloomed during the previous administration.

I’m biased, though. My husband made a living in the oil and gas biz until he retired. Nikki Haley toured a land rig in West Texas today. I’ve been on one rig in my life and it was a jack-up rig that was having some maintenance work done while docked along the Texas coast. It was really interesting. It was a rig that drills offshore.

Imagine working in an industry that the president has announced he wants to destroy. Apparently Joe Biden and the others don’t realize how solar panels are made – and most are made in China. Fossil fuels contribute to just about everything. And, the industry employs millions of people. It’s not just the people working on rigs, it is also all the service industries and contractors who keep things running. Traditional energy companies have been working to develop clean energy technology for many years and put to work what is successfully created. I’ll get off my soapbox now.

Nikki Haley was outside of Midland, Texas Thursday.

‘I mean, look at this beautiful rig,’ she told DailyMail.com in an exclusive interview following the tour, pointing behind her.

Haley, who served as the former Ambassador to the United Nations under the Trump administration, said that while she was at the U.N., enemies of the U.S. didn’t want ‘us to have a strong military’ and ‘they didn’t want us to be energy independent.’

You won’t see Joe Biden touring an oil rig. He might actually learn something instead of swallowing the propaganda spouted by people who demand we “keep it in the ground.” Haley is right when she says that energy independence is a national security issue. When we have to beg for oil from other countries, it is from some bad actors. They do not have our best interests at heart. They are not our friends. OPEC has no respect for Joe Biden. Earlier this week, the OPEC+ countries agreed to extend oil production cuts they announced in April through the end of 2024. This decision reduces the amount of crude they pump into the world market by more than 1 million barrels per day.

‘In my administration, we would stop criminalizing these energy producers and we would make sure that we are partners with them and do whatever it takes to be energy independent,’ Haley pledged.

‘We would make sure we stopped controlling where they produce and how much they produce. We would roll back the green subsidies that we see today. And we would make sure that we’re focused on speeding up the permitting process for the pipelines and getting the EPA out of the way.’

‘A full strong foreign policy is good for energy policy,’ she reiterated during the interview with DailyMail.com.

‘That’s why we came here to Midland today. And I hope every American can see what we saw today.’

Haley spoke with workers and discussed the day-to-day operations, as well as challenges, and learned about constraints the administration’s policies place on energy producers. She probably got an earful.

‘It’s beautiful to see up close,’ she remarked during the tour at the top of the rig in the so-called ‘dog house’ where operations stem from.

The Helmerich & Payne (H&P) Rig 480 is located in Stanton, Texas, about a 20 minute drive from Midland and employes roughly 1,000 workers in total servicing six large wells that will garner about $60 million every seven months.

Workers on the rig told DailyMail.com that they work 12 hour shifts for 14 days straight and then have 14 days off to spend with their families. There are living accommodations for the rig staff onsite.

The number of days worked can vary, depending on the rig and the schedule. Not all are 14 and 14. They can be 7 and 7, or 21 and 21. It depends. And, if a rig worker is traveling overseas, it is usually always the longer shifts. It is usually 21 and 21 or 28 and 28.

A “lack of understanding” from the Biden administration about energy issues is frustrating to rig mangers. The instability of not knowing the next administration’s energy policies while the oil industry is still trying to recover from a massive decline in the number of workers since the pandemic is difficult.

The Haley campaign put out a five-point plan for “American energy dominance” on Thursday. It includes getting the government out of the way and speeding up the permitting process for pipelines. Haley said that standing up to energy dictators in Russia, Iran, and Venezuela is critical. She’s right. Trump got energy policy right. He got the government out of the way and that alone is a huge help. I think any of the other serious contenders for the GOP nomination will have the same idea.

American crude is the cleanest in the world. The crude we import is not.

Haley criticized Biden over two big decisions – cancelling the Keystone Pipeline and re-entering the Paris Climate Agreement.

“Biden comes in with a heavy fist,” Haley said. “He puts on heavy regulations (on energy companies); he starts to suppress permitting; he worries more about endangered species. I think he cares more about sagebrush lizards then he does about what it’s doing to the American family.”

Ron DeSantis wasn’t the only Republican presidential candidate raising money in Texas on Thursday. Haley’s trip included a fundraiser in Midland.