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President Trump has found an issue that unifies - that unites California Democrats and Florida Republicans. Now officials from both parties in Florida, like those in California, are pushing back against Trump's plan to begin new offshore drilling. Here's NPR's Greg Allen.
GREG ALLEN, BYLINE: The Trump administration plan would open areas off California where there have been no new oil drilling leases issued for decades. It would also permit drilling in an area of the eastern Gulf of Mexico, where the federal government has never allowed it before. The reaction, nearly all negative in both states, was immediate. Here's California's Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom.
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GAVIN NEWSOM: Offshore oil drilling is overwhelmingly opposed by members of all political parties in the state of California. It's dead on arrival.
ALLEN: There are few things Newsom and Florida's Republican governor, Ron DeSantis, agree on. They've sparred and debated over gun safety laws, abortion, COVID and their governing philosophies. But they both oppose the Trump administration's new offshore drilling plan. DeSantis noted that in 2020, Florida officials helped convince first-term President Trump to put a moratorium on oil leases in the eastern Gulf - in the same area he now wants to open.
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RON DESANTIS: And I think that would weaken protections that we worked very hard to establish offshore. And, yes, part of it's environmental, but part of it's military.
ALLEN: A section of the eastern Gulf of Mexico serves as a test and training site for military bases on Florida's Panhandle. The day the plan was released, eight of Florida's Republican members of Congress sent Trump a letter saying drilling there is, quote, "incompatible with military operations and recreational uses." Supporters of the administration's proposal say it would give the oil and gas industry something it's long wanted - new areas where it can begin drilling. Frank Maisano, an energy expert who works with the oil and gas industry, says there's particular interest in the eastern Gulf.
FRANK MAISANO: We know that the area's mapped. We know that that area has resources. We know that there's infrastructure close to that area, whether it's drillships you move over or whether it's the workforce that's there.
ALLEN: But in Florida, keeping drilling out of the eastern Gulf has long been something nearly all the state's officials could agree on. That's because there's widespread recognition that Florida's tourist-based economy rests on beautiful oil-free beaches. 2010 brought a reminder of how important that is.
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UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: An oil rig exploded off the coast of Venice, critically injuring several people.
ALLEN: WWL-TV was among the first to report the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig off Louisiana coast, in which 11 people died. Although Florida is more than 100 miles to the east, oil washed up on some state beaches. A study commissioned by the state estimated it had more than a $1 billion impact on Florida's economy as visitors stayed away. Fifteen years later, the Gulf is still recovering. Steve Murawski, a fisheries biologist at the University of South Florida, says some species have never come back.
STEVE MURAWSKI: The marine mammal population, particularly the bottlenose dolphins up in Barataria Bay and some of the coastal populations, have never rebounded. We don't see as many sperm whales in the Gulf of Mexico as we used to.
ALLEN: The area in the eastern Gulf slated to open under the Trump administration plan is particularly challenging for drilling. Murawski says that's because it's in the Loop Current, which runs from the Gulf, past the Florida Keys, into the Gulf Stream and up the U.S. East Coast.
MURAWSKI: That current can run 5 or 6 knots, you know, and so it'll bend steel, right? And so you have to be very careful about that. And of course, you know, if you do have an accident, it's going to go a long distance in a short time.
ALLEN: In 2018, more than two-thirds of Florida voters approved a constitutional amendment banning drilling in state waters, which extend 10 miles off the Gulf Coast. And last month, before the Trump administration announcement, both of the state's Republican senators co-sponsored a bill seeking to put into law a ban on drilling off Florida ordered by former Democratic President Joe Biden.
Greg Allen, NPR News, Miami.
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