Kamala Harris visits Africa to strengthen US ties, avoids Republic of Congo

Vice President Kamala Harris is in the African Nation of Ghana today, the first stop on a three-nation tour with hopes of countering China's growing influence on the continent. And notably absent from the VP's itinerary is a visit to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the world's number one provider of minerals, vital to the administration's green agenda. Gabrielle Hoffman is the host of the District of Conservation podcast and joins us now. Gabrielle, thanks for being here. Let's get to the Congo point in just a moment, but big picture, is this visit too little, too late to counter China? Good morning, Todd and Ashley. Thank you so much for having me on. Excuse me.

Yes, I believe it is because it's an interesting timing with China wielding its influence over Africa and much of the world with the Belt Road Initiative. And also with China in contrast with us, not really adopting net zero policies. They're still opening coal plants each day and it runs counter to what the VP is related to, to push renewable energy projects. I mean, there is a huge push by this administration. The Secretary of State was first to visit and then Jill Biden went to visit. Now Kamala Harris and then President Biden is saying that he is going to visit later this year. So what do you think the actual goal of this is? Because like I said, it is a really big push.

Is it just to deepen their relationship or is it something more? It's an interesting kind of quandary that the United States finds itself in with China established relationships in Africa, but China's growing influence is not an accident. They've been very active in the region and they certainly want to be available to African countries like the three that the Vice President is visiting. But like I mentioned earlier, the United States with its push for net zero and I hope the Vice President doesn't push electric buses. That concerns me greatly because that's her favorite clean energy project because China is like I said, they're still not phasing away coal, oil and gas. And in Africa, there was recently a report from the Associated Press that said that the continent suffering electricity shortages in the United States and other Western nations have pumped $8.5 billion to help them transition. And so China is not arguing that message, but we are.

And so there's kind of this kind of twin problem that we have and China is appealing to them. And I'm not sure the Vice President is able to counter them. What's so interesting about what you just said is the fact that with that in mind, we continue to push green, green, green, green, green. And the only way you get green is by mining cobalt because cobalt is what goes into those items that are green. Those items, by the way, that China mines the cobalt for through Africa and then sells back to us at a profit so that we end up strengthening the CCP. With all that in mind, Gabriella, shouldn't Kamala Harris be headed to, I don't know, the Congo where they mine this cobalt? You'd think that'd be on a heritainery, but she chose Ghana interestingly enough before I answer the Congo component. Ghana last year almost collapsed.

They've adopted and embraced green bonds, these green social and sustainability bonds. The World Bank was praising them as a leader. And at the height of last summer, Ghana almost collapsed due to protests felt from high inflation, more exorbitant costs being felt by the people there. And so ESG bonds almost collapsed Ghana. So it's interesting she chose that. But back to Congo, yes, it's home to 90% of cobalt reserves. The conditions are very dire.

You look at pictures, you can't help but shrug it, looking at the ghastly environmental conditions, working conditions. All labor that is used, they're only paid $2.50 if they're lucky. And our, if we were mining here domestically, we wouldn't be seeing these abhorrent conditions. We wouldn't be having to rely on our adversaries whatsoever. The United States mines and refines much better than other countries, especially countries that are dealing with China. And China has, as you mentioned, their vested interests in these different outposts.

And it's going to be extremely expensive and extremely problematic to have to rely on countries like the Congo, which you should have visited and pointed out the problems with the conditions there, then rather than sourcing here. But net zero policies are very impossible to implement. They have a lot of tradeoffs, a lot of kind of hypocrisies with respect to environmental input and much more. So her not highlighting Calpa is a big disappointment, but it's to be expected. Yeah. I mean, these kids are two years old, covered in chemicals. Others who just had babies on their backs working, you would think that she would go visit this.

But instead, it seems like they're turning the blind eye because of their greening. She's going to a recording studio. So she'll be on the ones and twos as these children literally are about to die because of all the chemicals that they're ingesting. Yeah, exactly. Gabriella Hoffman, thank you. Thank you so much, Todd and Ashley. You're welcome.

I'm Steve Ducey. I'm Brian Kilmeade. And I'm Ainsley Earhart. And click here to subscribe to the Fox News YouTube page to catch our hottest interviews and most compelling analysis.

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