While President Donald Trump began his new year opening Venezuela to U.S. oil companies and pining over Greenland’s potential oil and critical mineral reserves, American shale producers became increasingly miffed over the commander-in-chief’s focus on international energy as opposed to their declining domestic profits.
Although the U.S. is, in fact, churning out barrels of oil near all-time highs, Trump’s “Drill, baby, drill” ethos is ringing hollow amid weaker oil prices and waning drilling activity. The president’s fixation on lower prices at the pump is working in his favor—largely because of higher OPEC output, as he desired. But cheap fuel proves a detriment to U.S. oil producers struggling to turn a profit for their crude.
“I think everyone feels a bit slighted here,” the CEO of one big U.S. oil producer told Fortune, requesting confidentiality to avoid any potential reprisal from the Trump administration.
The U.S. benchmark for crude oil is sitting at just under $60 per barrel, the threshold below which American oil producers struggle to profit and justify new activity. And the number of active oil-drilling rigs has plunged about 15% for the year as of Jan. 16. Despite all that, previous drilling activity and oilfield efficiency gains have pushed domestic oil production near world-leading, all-time highs of 13.8 million barrels a day—a stubbornly high level that’s contributing to lower oil prices. U.S. producers are at least pleased that Trump has expedited green-lighting energy projects and rolled back environmental protections.
