A bill backed by House Democrats would give President Joe Biden authority to declare an energy emergency that would make it unlawful to increase gasoline and home energy fuel prices in an “excessive” or exploitative manner.“At a time when people across the country are feeling the pinch at the gas pump, Congress needs to be doing all it can to bring down costs for American families,” said Rep. Kim Schrier, D-Wash., who co-sponsored the bill.
ExxonMobil XOM, +0.38%, Chevron CVX, -0.48% and other major oil companies announced profits totaling more than $40 billion in the first quarter of the year, a fact Democrats repeatedly cited in floor debate. Many of the companies are spending billions on stock buybacks and dividend payments to investors.
Biden, aware of the political stakes, has vowed to do all he can to ease “pain at the pump for American families,” including ordering release of record amounts of oil from the nation’s strategic reserve.Louisiana Rep. Steve Scalise, the No. 2 House Republican, called the bill an attempt by Democrats “to distract and shift blame from the administration’s self-inflicted energy and inflation crisis.”
The vote on the House bill comes as Interior Secretary Deb Haaland said she will release a long-delayed, five-year plan that allows the Interior Department to conduct new offshore oil and gas lease sales. The current plan expires June 30, and administration officials had not said when or if a replacement would be released.
The real price gouger is the Biden admin for killing the Keystone pipeline and stymying domestic energy productions.
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