Sen. Grassley reacts to Biden’s E15 announcement

DAVENPORT, Iowa (KWQC) - Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley stopped in the Quad Cities on Tuesday for a Q&A session.

At the Quad Cities Chamber of Commerce event, small business owners asked Grassley questions on things from immigration reform to electric cars.

The Senator also took questions from the media about President Biden authorizing the use of E15 gasoline this summer.

While Grassley applauded the president’s announcement on Tuesday, he said Biden should have made the move for year-round E-15 use sooner.

“We can’t sell E15, during these three and a half months out of the year,” Grassley said. “It’s just not a good way to market a product. You get people used to using E15 — particularly the lower price — they’ll keep using it. We got great capacity of unused capacity in our ethanol plants and we can satisfy the needs of biofuels.”

According to the U.S. Department of Energy, Iowa is the leading producer of ethanol in the country.

The senator understands the War in Ukraine is part of the reason for the rise in gas prices. However, He also blamed Biden’s policy decisions surrounding fracking, drilling and the Keystone XL Pipeline.

“We were energy independent, on January the 19th (2021), and then Biden comes in as president, all of a sudden we become an energy-dependent country,” Grassley said. “That’s probably responsible for $1, $1.10 of the first increase in the price of gas.”

When it comes to combating inflation, Grassley said the Federal Reserve will have to do most of the work, but this administration’s spending hasn’t helped.

“Now, Congress created some of this by the $2 trillion, that Congress appropriated on a partisan basis, with only Democrat votes, March of a year ago,” Grassley said. “Liberal economists said, you’ve already spent too much in 2020, you’re gonna have an inflation problem, don’t do anymore.”

Last August Senator Grassley voted in favor of Biden’s $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill.

The Iowa Democratic Party also reacted, with party chair Ross Wilburn releasing the following statement:

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