Trump’s Hormuz Illusion: Why American Oil Will Not Protect US Households

Donald Trump has leaned on a simple argument throughout the Iran war: the United States produces so much oil that the Strait of Hormuz is no longer America’s problem. It is an appealing line because it sounds like strength and independence at once. It is also deeply misleading. The real question is not whether the US still imports as much Gulf oil as it once did. It does not. The real question is whether Americans live inside a global energy system whose prices are still shaped by what happens in Hormuz. They do. And that means a serious shock in the strait would still hit the United States hard, not through dependence in the old import sense, but through exposure [...]
2026-04-29 12:22:17