Commentary: Big Tent Ideas

Uncle Sam’s Aggressive Rare Earth Dealmaking Strikes A Chord Overseas

Håkan Dahlström/Wikimedia Commons

In June of 2021, President Joe Biden announced that his administration would mount a “whole of government” effort to secure U.S. supplies and supply chains related to a raft of critical energy minerals.

Biden was responding to the then-dawning reality that the glorious “energy transition” from fossil fuels like oil, natural gas and coal to wind, solar and electric vehicles he hoped to force could possibly take place without massive new supplies of minerals like lithium, cobalt, antimony, copper, silver and the array of rare earths that are integral to the manufacture of batteries, solar arrays and wind turbines and towers.

In his speech that June, Biden, reading from his ever-present teleprompter, detailed the need for the U.S. and other western nations to free supply chains for these important minerals from Chinese dominance. His assessment of the situation and the dangers it presented to U.S. national security was spot on. Unfortunately, his administration made very little progress over the final 3 1/2 years of his autopen presidency to do much about it. 

That has all changed since Donald Trump took the oath of office for his second term in office in January 2025. Instead of the afterthought treatment throughout Biden’s term, the Trump cabinet has made the reshoring and friendshoring of these crucial supply chains one of the administration’s top energy-related priorities. The scope of that progress is beginning to gain recognition even at some of the most prominent pro-energy transition media platforms. 

In an Aug. 21 article, the Financial Times details how the United States under Trump is far outpacing similar, though flagging efforts by the European Union. The piece quotes an unnamed lawyer who is advising various European rare earth projects as saying, “Whether you agree or disagree with the way in which the Trump administration is going about securing their critical raw materials supply chains, in 18 months, they’ve certainly done more deals than Europe has done in the past decade.”

Bernd Schafer, CEO of EIT Raw Materials, was also complimentary of the Trump approach, saying, “I really admire the Americans because they take an idea and they run with it, while we Europeans hesitate, over-administrate, talk and lose time.”

This really is not surprising given President Trump’s hyper-focus on making deals in all aspects of his presidency. The President’s personal involvement – compared to Biden’s noted inattention to detail and inability to focus more than a few hours per day – has no doubt help accelerate America’s transition in this area. As Schafer notes, time is of the essence for both the United States and Europe as countries throughout the west scramble to secure both the resources they require and find ways to accelerate domestic refining capabilities, an area over which China has long held near-monopoly dominance.

To that end, the Pentagon moved last year to invest in an equity interest in California based MP Materials, one of a small handful of companies with current processing capabilities. Earlier this month, the Energy Department entered into a loan commitment of up to $725 million to speed the development of processing capability expansion by Energy Fuels at its White Mesa Mill in Utah. 

Energy Fuels CEO Ross Bhappu told me in a recent interview that it “absolutely makes sense for the U.S. Government to step in and provide support, especially during the time when you’re repaying these loans. That’s the time when, if the price falls dramatically and you’re not able to pay off those loans, you’re stuck and it really puts you in a bind. So, providing floor prices is vitally important.”

The aggressive behavior in protecting its market share for which the Chinese government has become notorious has long been a stumbling block that has often prevented similar projects in the U.S. and other western countries from advancing in recent decades. The reality is that the Trump administration has been willing to act aggressively in America’s interests, using all the tools at its disposal in direct contrast to both Biden and the EU.

All of which proves there is nothing magic about any of this: It just takes a firm commitment to doing whatever it takes and real leadership from the top.

David Blackmon is an energy writer and consultant based in Texas. He spent 40 years in the oil and gas business, where he specialized in public policy and communications.

The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.