The fate of the vast quantities of oil and gas lodged under the shale, mud and sandstone of American drilling fields will in large part determine whether the world retains a livable climate. And the US, the world’s largest extractor of oil, is poised to unleash these fossil fuels in spectacular volumes.

Planned drilling projects across US land and waters will release 140 billon metric tons of planet-heating gases if fully realized, an analysis shared with the Guardian has found.

On Monday, it was reported that Google, which owns YouTube, had decided to term “mostly false” the claims that Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden stated in the past that he would ban fracking, adding that term if a user of their YouTube platform searched for Biden making such a statement.

It was also reported that no similar fact-check was posted about videos from the mainstream media that featured debunked claims about the infamous Steele dossier that was used to attack President Trump.

This Abridge News topic aggregates four unique arguments on different sides of the debate. Here are the quick facts to get you started:

THE QUICK FACTS

The vice presidential debate between Vice President Mike Pence and Kamala Harris on Wednesday featured discussion of some of the most pressing issues facing the country: the coronavirus pandemic, the economy, President Trump’s record and the Supreme Court. One topic that got more attention than most pundits might have expected was fracking.

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BIDEN BACK TO EXPLAINING FRACKING STANCE: Joe Biden’s stance on fracking isn’t winning him any favors with the right or the far left.

The Democratic presidential nominee has for months sought to clarify his position on fracking after a gaffe in a March primary debate with Bernie Sanders in which he declared “no new fracking,” and he’s largely muddied the waters.

A TV ad from a Republican super PAC uses video of Joe Biden inaccurately explaining his climate plan against him. Biden’s campaign has said he would not completely ban fossil fuels, specifically fracking, as the ad appears to show him saying.

The ad, from America First Action, which supports the reelection of President Donald Trump, shows a clip from a July 2019 CNN debate in which Biden said, “we would make sure it’s eliminated,” when asked if there would be a place for “fossil fuels, including coal and fracking” if Biden becomes president.

The terrible effects of the presidential candidate’s plan to ban fracking wouldn’t be limited to the economy.

Editor’s Note: The following is the final installment of a three-part series adapted from David L. Bahnsen’s new book, Elizabeth Warren: How Her Presidency Would Destroy the Middle Class and the American Dream. Part I is here; part II is here.

A look at some of the business, personal and ideological ties that bind megadonors in the 2016 presidential campaign.

A federal judge agreed Tuesday to postpone the Obama administration's tough new hydraulic fracturing restrictions just hours before they were scheduled to take effect.

Gov. Gary Herbert said Utah will join three other states in a legal challenge to a new federal rule that governs hydraulic fracturing, arguing the fledgling regulation duplicates what states are already doing and will be costly and inefficient.

The rule was announced recently the Bureau of Land Management and comes despite a strenuous campaign by energy-rich states that argued the agency should leave fracking ov