STANTON, Texas — Republican presidential candidate and former Governor of South Carolina Nikki Haley stopped by Stanton on Thursday morning to tour an oil rig and talk about energy independence.
"The number one thing that any president should look at is national security, and in order to have national security, you have to be energy independent," said Haley.
Haley also spoke about the number of jobs the oil and gas industry creates within the United States.
"A rig like this, its reach effect is 1,000 jobs, 1,000 American jobs come from just one rig," said Haley. "That doesn't count the small businesses that all benefit from it. That doesn't count what it does for every American family not having to worry if something happens in the Middle East, not having to worry if OPEC does something."
Haley said that if she were to take office, she would change current policies related to the oil and gas industry.
"We are going to make sure that we focus on not criminalizing all of this, but making sure that we stop any sort of permits, regulations that are going to slow things down," said Haley. "We want to make sure that we stop all the green subsidies, get those out of the way, we want to speed up permitting so that these pipelines can happen faster."
Republican presidential candidate and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis was also in Midland on Wednesday. He was seen visiting with members of the Republican National Hispanic Assembly Midland Chapter.