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The Republican presidential candidate’s struggle to appease the antagonistic industries was in the spotlight Thursday when his campaign published a fact sheet calling for the elimination of a slew of regulations, including a scandal-marred system of buying and selling biofuel blending credits that some oil refiners hate.

“The EPA’s renewable identification number program penalizes refineries if they do not meet certain blending requirements,” Trump’s campaign said in the fact sheet. “These requirements have turned out to be impossible to meet and are bankrupting many of the small and midsize refineries in this country. These regulations will give Big Oil an oligopoly by destroying the small to mid-size refineries.”

If Iowa growers — who back the mandated use of ethanol and the credits created to make that system work — were worried Trump was backing off his support of the corn-based fuel, they needn’t be. Hours later the campaign re-issued the fact sheet with that language deleted and no explanation.

In the initial fact sheet released along with his speech to the Economic Club of New York, Trump said the climbing cost of those credits, known as renewable identification numbers, or RINs, threatens to bankrupt merchant refiners who must buy them because they don’t have infrastructure to blend required amounts of ethanol into their gasoline.

Tuesday in Iowa

Trump endorsed the underlying biofuel quotas as recently as Tuesday, when he vowed to protect the government’s Renewable Fuel Standard and the corn-based ethanol that satisfies much of the program today. Especially given that commitment, the Trump campaign’s assertion “shouldn’t be interpreted as a reversal of support for the RFS,” said Bob Dinneen, president of the Renewable Fuels Association.

The position wins support in the Corn Belt, though it is a rare point of division between Trump and the oil industry, which is pushing Congress to spike the biofuel mandates. On other energy issues, Trump is closely aligned with the interests of the oil industry. Trump advocates more drilling on public land and has promised to rescind environmental regulations, including the Clean Power Plan that restricts greenhouse gas emissions.

Divided industry

Still, Trump’s decision to inject himself to one side of the biofuel debate two days after pledging...