Trump aims to open California coast to oil drilling; Senator Padilla and Governor Newsom denounce plan

Draft proposal seeks six California lease sales despite clear legal limits and decades of bipartisan coastal protections

By Miriam Raftery

Photo:  dead seabirds killed by the Exxon Valdez oil spill off Alaska in 1989.  Source.

November 20, 2025 (Washington D.C.) – The Trump administration today released its draft 2027 to 2032 Offshore Oil and Gas Leasing plan, the most aggressive push in decades to open all of the California coast to oil and gas drilling. The proposal includes six lease sales off  Southern California between 2027 and 2030, the first attempt to drill in these waters in more than 40 years.

California has suffered environmental catastrophes with multiple major oil spills in the past from offshore drilling, including the devastating 1969 Santa Barbara spill that dumped an estimated 80,000 to 100,000 gallons of crude oil into the ocean.  That spill killed 3,500 sea birds as well as marine mammals such as seals and dolphins. Outraged from the public helped lead to formation of the U.S. Environmental protection agency and passage of major legislation include the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), the Clean Water Act, and in California the California Coastal Commission and California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA).

In Santa Barbara, an offshore oiling platform had an explosion.  Oil drilling also brings other potential sources of massive pollution from transporting crude oil, including pipeline ruptures and oil tanker disasters.  The spill also had huge economic consequences, crippling coastal industries from fishing to tourism.

I lived in Santa Barbara nearly a decade after the big spill.  Clumps of oily tar still washed up onto beaches, polluting the water and shore.  I also visited the site of the even more destructive 1989 Exxon Valdez oil tanker spill in Alaska, where the shoreline remained contaminated more than two decades after 10 million gallons of crude oil flowed into the sea. 

Today, U.S. Senator Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), a member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, and House Natural Resources Committee Ranking Member Jared Huffman (D-Calif.-02) released a statement condemning the Trump Administration’s draft 2027-2032 Outer Continental Shelf Oil and Gas Leasing Program. The plan proposes opening vast swaths of previously protected federal waters — including the California coast — to new oil and gas drilling for the first time in over 40 years.

“With this draft plan, Donald Trump and his Administration are trying to destroy one of the most valuable, most protected coastlines in the world and hand it over to the fossil fuel industry. They didn’t listen to Californians. They didn’t listen to communities up and down the West Coast. Instead, Trump wants to take a wrecking ball to our communities while trampling over anyone who stands between him and what billionaires demand.”

The statement continues, ““These lease areas are not only irreplaceable, but allowing drilling in these areas would undermine military readiness and pose risks to national security. But Trump doesn’t care. Californians remember every spill, every dead dolphin and sea otter, every fishing season wrecked by contamination. We built stronger, cleaner, more resilient coastal communities — and a burgeoning $1.7 trillion coastal economy — in spite of all that. And we’re not going to stand by and watch it get destroyed by Trump’s oil and gas pet projects.

“This plan targets California and the whole West Coast because they think we will roll over. They are wrong. We’re going to fight this with everything we have.”

This move directly targets areas President Biden withdrew from future leasing in January 2025, when he protected 625 million acres in the Pacific, Atlantic, Eastern Gulf, and Arctic.

Trump tried to wipe out those protections on his first day back in office, repeating the same maneuver a federal court rejected in 2017 when he attempted to undo President Obama’s Arctic and Atlantic withdrawals.

Senator Padilla and Representative Huffman have been leading the charge against offshore oil and gas leases. Last month, Padilla and Huffman led over 100 lawmakers in demanding President Trump and Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum immediately cease any plans to open new offshore oil and gas leases in U.S. federal waters off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, in the Arctic Ocean and northern Bering Sea off of Alaska, and in the Eastern Gulf. 

“The Biden administration slammed the brakes on offshore oil and gas leasing and crippled the long-term pipeline of America’s offshore production,” Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said in a statement. “By moving forward with the development of a robust, forward-thinking leasing plan, we are ensuring that America’s offshore industry stays strong, our workers stay employed, and our nation remains energy dominant for decades to come.”

Governor Gavin Newsom, speaking at the COP 30 conference, called the administration’s move to open new waters off the California coast to drilling “dead on arrival.”

“For decades, California has stood firm in our opposition to new offshore drilling, and nothing will change that,” Newsom said in a statement. “We will use every tool at our disposal to protect our coastline. “It’s interesting that Donald’s proposal doesn’t include the waters off Mar-a-Lago,” he added.

On Earth Day, Padilla and Huffman, along with Senator Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Senator Jack Reed (D-R.I.), and Representative Frank Pallone (D-N.J.-06), announced a pair of bills to permanently protect the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans from the dangers of fossil fuel drilling.

Padilla and Huffman’s West Coast Ocean Protection Act would permanently prohibit new oil and gas leases for offshore drilling off the coast of California, Oregon, and Washington. In 2021, Senator Padilla joined West Coast Senators in calling on Senate leadership to include the West Coast Ocean Protection Act in the Senate version of the budget reconciliation bill after an estimated 126,000 gallons of oil spilled off the coast of California.