WASHINGTON, D.C. , May 16, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — For decades, the United States has chased energy independence, economic stability, and domestic control of critical supply chains. But according to former CIA advisor Jim Rickards, the answer may have been within reach all along — just locked behind regulatory red tape.
“There’s a reason we’ve never truly broken free of the energy trap,” Rickards says. “We’ve ignored the one asset that could’ve changed it all.”
That asset? A $150 trillion strategic reserve of untapped minerals, energy-critical metals, buried across federally managed U.S. land.
A LEGAL WALL REMOVED, A DOOR OPENED
Rickards points to the Supreme Court’s 2024 ruling overturning the Chevron Doctrine as a historic turning point. For decades, Chevron gave federal agencies unilateral power to interpret and enforce their own rules — often shutting down access to public land.
“That ruling didn’t just change the law,” Rickards explains. “It restructured who gets to decide …