During the 2024 campaign, President Donald Trump promised voters that his policies would lower their energy prices by 50 percent, repeating this pledge in speeches in New York, Pennsylvania and North Carolina. “We will cut energy and electricity prices in half within 12 months—not just for businesses but for all Americans and their families,” he wrote in a Newsweek op-ed.
That hasn’t happened. Nationwide, electricity bills are up 13 percent compared to last year, with some states facing steeper jumps than others. One of the reasons for those increases is the growing export of liquefied natural gas and a corresponding spike in gas prices, argues a new report from Public Citizen, a nonprofit consumer advocacy organization.
The analysis, based on data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration, found that Americans paid $12 billion more for natural gas between January and September 2025 than they did over the same period last year. Because natural gas is used to heat homes directly and to power the electric grid, its price has an outsized impact on Americans’ utility bills. Higher exports leave Americans more exposed to swings in the global market.
LNG exports were up 22 percent this year, according to the report. While the U.S. is already the world’s largest exporter of the fuel, the second Trump administration has made increasing LNG exports a priority.
“Trump’s prioritization of LNG exports is directly in the way of efforts to address energy affordability,” said Tyson Slocum, author of the report and the director of Public Citizen’s energy program. “Twenty-five percent of all of America’s natural gas production is being dedicated to natural gas exports.”
While it’s true that California, Hawaii and states in New England have higher prices on average, electricity prices in Missouri, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Nebraska and Wyoming—all Republican-leaning states—have gone up the most since Trump took office, an Inside Climate News analysis of EIA data through September shows. Missouri is contending with a nearly 42 percent increase since January.
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This is blatant screwing the American industry and public. Trump Administration and LNG companies can sell their product to Japan, Europe, and elsewhere for higher prices than to the American industry and public.
