During a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing last week, Rep. Young Kim (R-CA) spoke about the elimination of the State Department's Bureau of Energy Resources.
00:03Thank you, Chairman. I want to thank the Secretary for joining us today.
00:09On May 29, 2025, this year, the committee received notification of the department's intent to reorganize its domestic operations and functions.
00:19As part of this reorganization, the department is eliminating the Bureau of Energy Resources, or ENR.
00:25So I want to talk to you a little bit about that. And also, in testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in May,
00:33Secretary Rubio stated, energy is going to be at the forefront of foreign policy for the next 100 years.
00:40And we just don't have, we just don't produce enough global energy to meet the AI demand.
00:47I wholeheartedly agree with that.
00:49So if energy policy will be at the forefront of our foreign policy for the next 100 years, as Secretary Rubio projects,
00:57and we know energy diplomacy is essential to meet our future AI demands,
01:04can you talk to us why there is a need to eliminate the Bureau of Energy Resources?
01:10Sir, thank you for that. Thank you for that question, Congresswoman.
01:15So the Bureau, that Bureau has been consolidated into the Undersecretary for Economic Growth, Energy, and the Environment.
01:25So those functions continue to remain. Our commitment to energy development and energy dominance are one of the central themes of the President's administration.
01:36This is just simply a consolidation of that Bureau into the larger economic Bureau.
01:41It wasn't a criticism or anything. As you know, I chaired the subcommittee on the E-Family.
01:45So we welcome the opportunity to work on that issue. And I just had a, my subcommittee hearing on breaking the choke point of the China's dominance on critical minerals, rare earth elements.
01:59I mean, these are so important issues. So I look forward to that opportunity.
02:02And hopefully I can work with you and your office in meeting those demands.
02:09But in 1980, moving on, the Foreign Commercial Service was pulled out of the Department of Commerce to, and that was transferred to commerce to elevate the importance of commercial diplomacy.
02:24But looking at the last, you know, few decades, the opposite has occurred, in my view.
02:32The move divorced commercial diplomacy from our foreign policy and limited the ability or our ability to help American businesses access the foreign markets and protect them from predatory practices.
02:47Our focus should be helping our American businesses, especially abroad, especially in the region, in the Indo-Pacific,
02:55especially with the diplomatic tools in the toolkit in the box that's available.
03:02So as we are working to reauthorize the State Department, we are considering a proposal to bring the FCS back into the department.
03:14So would you support such a move?
03:16I'd be happy to work with the committee on that proposal.
03:20I think, you know, our engagement with countries, I think the president has really led the way on that with his trip to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the UAE,
03:30where he showed the importance of economic diplomacy.
03:34Obviously, there are other equities, other departments that may have a say in that.
03:39But I'd be happy to weigh in about the importance of that work.
03:43You can weigh in strongly and as you do and consider our proposal, you will allow my team to work with yours and then make that transfer back to state.
03:56I hope it does as seamless as possible.
03:59So I hope you can commit to working with my team on that.
04:03Yes.
04:04Okay.
04:05And in April, there were reports that the department was considering closing its consular office in Busan, South Korea.
04:13South Korea, as you know, is a very critical ally of the United States and they share our concerns about North Korean aggression,
04:21expanding the Chinese influence and especially in the economic and military areas and Russia influence in the Indo-Pacific, especially the North areas.
04:32So what is the status of that proposed closure of the U.S. consulate office in Busan?
04:39Or is there such a proposal to actually eliminate that consulate office from Busan, South Korea?
04:46Thank you for that question.
04:48So I don't believe there is any proposal to close any facilities overseas.
04:53I do know that there was an analysis that was done earlier this year, which reviewed every post overseas.
05:01Its costs, its benefits, what services it was providing, any new revenue it was generating.
05:07Consular services in particular generates a fair amount of revenue for the department.
05:11Is there any other areas, the U.S. consulates in East Asia and the Pacific region that is under consideration?
05:19So I don't think it's fair to frame it as any any post being under consideration for closure.
05:24I think an analysis was done on or a sort of a data call was done and asked people to assess different posts overseas.
05:35But as of now, there are no plans to to close any facilities.
05:39Looks like my time's up. Thank you so much. I yield back.
