President Joe Biden has called on the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to probe possible anti-competitive or “illegal conduct” by oil and gas companies that may have pushed up prices at the pump, drawing a critical reaction from a major oil lobby that blamed the president’s policies for stifling American energy production. Biden said in a Nov. 17 letter to FTC head Lina Khan that there was “mounting evidence of anti-consumer behavior by oil and gas companies,” pointing to an apparent market dislocation—falling production costs and declining prices of unfinished gasoline, while pump prices are up. “Usually, prices at the pump correspond to movements in the price of unfinished gasoline, which is the main ingredient in the gas people buy at the gas station,” Biden wrote, noting that in the past month, the price of unfinished gasoline was down 5 percent while the retail price at the pump was up around …