Providing for consideration of the bill (H.R. 1229) to amend the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act to facilitate the safe and timely production of American energy resources from the Gulf of Mexico, and providing for consideration of the bill (H.R. 1230) to require the Secretary of the Interior to conduct certain offshore oil and gas lease sales, and for other purposes.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, the national average price of gasoline has gone up 10 cents in just the last week, and is now about 1\1/2\ cents nationally from $4 a gallon. By comparison, the price was $1.84 a gallon when President Obama was sworn into office.

In my home district in Central Washington last week, I heard from farmers, the foundation of our region's economy, who are finding it harder and harder to pay these high energy prices. And I have no doubt that my colleagues from other parts of the country have heard similar stories from their constituents.

The pain being felt today has been exacerbated by the actions of this administration, this administration which, for the past 2 years, has repeatedly blocked, hindered, and raised the cost to access to our American energy resources.

The House Natural Resources Committee recently passed three bills, H.R. 1229, 1230, and 1231, with bipartisan support, all of which reverse specific actions taken by the Obama administration to block offshore energy production. These bills will increase American energy production. They will create jobs, and they will lower energy prices. These are the first of an array of bills that will be introduced by our committee as part of the American energy initiative that will focus on expanding renewable energy, onshore production, hydropower, coal, critical minerals, and address offshore drilling revenue sharing and other needed reforms.

Today we are debating H.R. 1230, the Restarting America Offshore Leasing Now Act. This bill requires the Secretary of the Interior to conduct oil and natural gas lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico and offshore Virginia that have been delayed or canceled by this administration.

The Virginia lease sale, for example, was scheduled to happen this year; but due to the Obama administration actions, the earliest this lease sale could occur is now 2017.

This bill will create thousands of jobs and, according to CBO, it will generate $40 million in new revenue to the Federal Government over the next 10 years.

I will note that very soon after this bill passed out of committee, with bipartisan support, the Obama administration announced that it would move forward on one gulf lease sale. Prior to this sudden action, the Obama administration was on course to make 2011 the first year since 1958 that the Federal Government would not have held an offshore lease sale.

Squeezing one conveniently timed offshore lease sale does not undo the Obama administration's long track record of blocking and delaying American energy production. This bill that we are considering today is necessary to hold their feet to the fire and to ensure that these lease sales move forward.

Americans instinctively understand the pain inflicted by rising gasoline prices, but yet we continue to hear the same excuses on why we shouldn't act. And let me give you several examples.

My colleagues across the aisle will say that expanding drilling will do nothing to lower gasoline prices. The truth is, and this is the important part, it will send a strong signal to the world markets that the U.S. is serious about

producing our own resources and bringing more production, American production, online. Furthermore, this argument has been used by opponents to American energy production for decades. We can no longer delay and prevent access to our own American resources.

My colleagues will also propose increasing taxes on American energy production. Let me repeat that, Mr. Chairman. They will also propose increasing taxes on American energy production. I have to ask: When has raising taxes lowered the price of anything? And of course the answer to that is never. And it won't happen with energy. Whether it is taxing American energy producers or imposing a cap-and-trade national energy tax, the Democrats' plan will only further increase the price at the pump and ultimately cost jobs.

We are also likely to hear my colleagues reiterate the old ``use it or lose it'' myth, claiming that there are thousands of acres of nonproducing leases. Mr. Chairman, in reality, ``use it or lose it'' is already the law of the land. The moment a company pays for and receives a lease, the clock starts ticking. Leases have a time line. If action doesn't occur on that lease, the lease is lost, according to the lease.

In addition, and this is important, too, only about one-third of the leases contain oil or natural gas. Sometimes we think we are very powerful, but one thing we can't do is mandate production where there is no oil or natural gas.

And, finally, my colleagues will undoubtedly attempt to claim that these bills ignore the need to ensure safety in offshore drilling. Nobody has forgotten the tragic Deepwater Horizon accident. And I hear that especially from Members of the gulf, and, Mr. Chairman, I heard that when I was down at the gulf at a hearing only 2 weeks ago. However, we must not forget the fact of the economic threat that high gasoline prices have to our economy and our need to move forward.

The administration has slowly started to issue deepwater permits in the Gulf of Mexico, which is in direct recognition, by the way, that it can be done safely and responsibly or they wouldn't have done it. Yet my colleagues act as if nothing has changed at all as far as safety reforms. But by doing so, they are completely ignoring reality and the actions of their own party's administration.

They are ignoring the facts that regulations have been enhanced and strengthened; that standards have increased; and that new technologies have been developed, tested, and deployed. And, I might add, Mr. Chairman, we heard this at the hearing that I alluded to a moment ago in Houma, Louisiana, 2 weeks ago.

Furthermore, H.R. 1229, which we will debate next week, improves safety by making two reforms to current law. Number one, it requires that the Secretary issue a permit to drill; and, two, requires that the Secretary conduct safety reviews. Neither of those provisions are in current law today.

In 2008, the last time gasoline prices reached $4 a gallon, Congress stepped up to the challenge and took bold action to end a decades-long ban on new offshore drilling. Although this administration has effectively reimposed that ban, the American people are once again calling on Congress to act. By passing H.R. 1230 today, Congress can show the American people that we have heard their concerns and that we are taking actions.

So I urge my colleagues to vote in favor of the bill that will create American jobs, lower gasoline prices, and strengthen energy independence.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Goodlatte).

Will the gentleman yield?

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

The answer is that it will absolutely be a focus and a priority. When I first introduced the bill before us today, I stated that these are only the first steps in this Congress' efforts to increase American energy production.

The committee will continue to move forward on an array of bills that will be introduced in advance as part of the American Energy Initiative. Coming soon will be bills focused on expanding renewable energy, offshore production, onshore production, hydropower, coal, critical minerals and revenue sharing.

Today, only a few select States receive revenue sharing from OCS activities. This committee will be working to reform OCS revenues to ensure that there is a fair treatment to all States that produce oil and gas in the OCS. Revenue sharing will be a priority, and action will be forthcoming.

At this time, I would like to yield 1\1/ 2\ minutes to the distinguished chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee, the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Upton).

Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Lamborn), the chairman of the subcommittee dealing with this legislation.

I am pleased to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from California (Mr. McClintock).

I would just note that the two Democrat Senators from Virginia and the Governor of this State are in favor of this legislation.

With that, Mr. Chairman, I am more than happy to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Johnson).

Mr. Chairman, may I inquire how much time remains on both sides.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New Mexico (Mr. Pearce).

Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Duncan), a member of the Natural Resources Committee.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 2 minutes.

Mr. Chairman, sometimes I am absolutely baffled by the rhetoric that I hear here. Let me remind my colleagues that 2\1/2\ years ago, in 2008, when gasoline prices went to $4 a gallon, we Republicans came into the House, even though we weren't in session, and talked about the potential resources that we have in this country to make America self- sufficient. And the American people got it. They got it and they said, you know, we ought to utilize those resources. And they said we should drill; we should drill in the Outer Continental Shelf and we should drill onshore.

The American people get it. Yet the rhetoric we're hearing here is entirely different from the economic issues that we face. Here is the whole point:

When America ended the moratoria on offshore drilling, the prices went down. See, that has never been explained by the other side, but it's pretty darned obvious. When you send a signal to the markets that you're serious about becoming less dependent on foreign energy, the markets respond. They responded 2\1/2\ years ago, and they will respond the same way. Yet all we hear from this side is you have to have a bogeyman. There has to be a bogeyman. Everybody is against us.

Baloney. The market is what drives the price of oil, and it's in our best interest in this country to become less dependent on foreign energy, and that's what these three bills do.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Benishek), a valuable member of the House Natural Resources Committee.

Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to another valuable member of the Natural Resources Committee, the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Wittman).

Mr. Chairman, at this time I am very pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Flake).

Mr. Chairman, I am very pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Landry).

I advise my friend I am the concluding speaker, so I will reserve the balance of my time.

I yield myself the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, this has been a very interesting debate, and there's been a lot of rhetoric thrown around, some of which doesn't even apply whatsoever in any remoteness to the bill that's before us today. H.R. 1230, which we are debating today, simply tells this administration to go through with the lease sales that were already authorized by a previous administration. In other words, all of these lease sales had gone through whatever process they had gone through. Three of them were in the Gulf of Mexico. One of them was off the coast of Virginia.

We are simply saying with this legislation, let's send a signal to the international markets that America is serious about becoming less dependent on foreign oil. And we do that by saying, this administration should go through with these lease sales, which, I might add, Mr. Chairman, we have heard about loss of revenue from the other side of the aisle. These lease sales themselves would provide the general fund with $40 million over the next 10 years. So what we're doing is really kind of ironic: We are telling this administration to do something it should be doing by law anyway. That's what the scope is. So I urge my colleagues to vote on this bill. We can have other discussion on the other bills in the ensuing days.

As far as the discussion talking about Big Oil, I could probably count the number of colleagues on the other side of the aisle that didn't say something about Big Oil rather than those that did. But what is interesting, you would be led to believe that the only Big Oil in the world apparently are American companies. I would suggest that that is entirely not true. In fact, when you talk about Big Oil, Mr. Chairman, really who you should be focusing on is OPEC, because crude oil is an international product, or is a global product. There's no question about that.

Yet OPEC controls 45 percent of the market. It is a cartel, Mr. Chairman; there is no question about that. We all know simple economics. If there is a cartel on any commodity, on any commodity, the way that you break the cartel is by increasing the supply. And that's what the combination of these three bills do. It simply sends a signal to the markets--and I have said this over and over--that we are serious about utilizing the resources we have. Several of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle have said, The United States doesn't have any resources. Well, nothing could be further from the truth because if you look at government data on what the potential resources are in the Outer Continental Shelf--and I'm going to say onshore because it's all American potential resources--the potential resources of oil equivalent per barrel, when you combine OCS and onshore, the potential resources are in excess of 2 trillion barrels of oil. That far exceeds what one of my colleagues earlier, Mr. Fleming from Louisiana, said. It far exceeds what they have in Saudi Arabia. In fact, in other OPEC nations.

This is rhetoric about trying to blame somebody when the issue is really something as basic as having a supply out there that consumers can utilize. What we are saying here is threefold. One of them relates directly to American jobs. Energy sector jobs are good-paying jobs. So let's encourage the energy sector in this country to expand so we can have those good-paying jobs. That's good to get the funk out of our economy. Secondly, we become less dependent on foreign sources because energy is an important part of our growing economy. And if we have a stable source of that in the future, our economy can grow with the surety we will have a stable source of energy.

But probably more important in the long term, Mr. Chairman, the reason why we should pass these bills to send the signal to the market is a national security issue. I mentioned OPEC. There are some countries in OPEC that are outwardly hostile to the United States. One of them is in South America, Venezuela. Why are we relying on them for the supply of our energy when we have these resources that I just pointed out to you in excess of 2 trillion equivalent barrels of oil?

So, Mr. Chairman, this is the first step. This is the first step of starting the process of becoming less dependent on foreign energy, and it is the first step to get our economy recovering by creating good American jobs. I urge my colleagues to support H.R. 1230.

Mr. Chair, I also want to mention that two members of the House, Congressman Gerlach and Congressman Culberson had wanted to cosponsor this bill but because we had to file the reports on the bills on Monday, they were unable to. I appreciate their support.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, I strongly oppose this amendment. The EIS work conducted thus far for the lease sales, and keep in mind, these lease sales were already okayed, is complete, thorough and sufficient to safely and responsibly conduct these lease sales.

It is important to note that this is only one of many environmental analyses that these leases will undergo before any drilling can start. At each of multiple stages, additional detailed environmental and safety reviews will be conducted.

The language in this bill, underlying bill, allows the administration to move forward with these lease sales in a timely manner, but does not allow drilling until at least several more layers of thorough environmental assessments and reviews are conducted on each lease sale sold at these sales. I think that's what the gentleman was getting to. The underlying bill allows that to happen.

These additional environmental studies will allow for the latest and best available information following the oil spill to be included in the studies and applied to any drilling that will take place.

In totality, the library of environmental reviews will end up totaling tens of thousands of pages, Mr. Chairman, and hundreds of hours by environmental scientists, engineers, biologists, and other professionals.

But this amendment isn't about environmental protection. This amendment is about removing the timelines in this bill to conduct these four lease sales. Keep in mind, these lease sales were already agreed to by a prior administration. The real effect of this amendment is to allow President Obama to block increased energy production by continuing to push these lease sales off past 2012 or 2017, in some cases. The real impact of this amendment is that we are right back where we started when the President canceled these lease sales, sending jobs and energy production overseas.

This administration's actions to delay these lease sales and their long record of anti-energy roadblocks is why 2011, this year, may be the first year since 1958 that no lease sales will occur in the OCS. It is for this reason that OCS revenues in 2011 will fall by more than $9 billion compared to 2008.

By validating the existing EIS work, the bill ensures that these lease sales will move forward this year, generating revenue for taxpayers and ensuring that our leasing program continues in a timely manner, while also allowing for additional safety measures to be taken.

I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on this amendment.

I yield the balance of my time to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Landry).

Mr. Speaker, I reserve a point of order.

Mr. Speaker, I withdraw my reservation, and I rise in opposition to the motion.

Mr. Speaker, I oppose this motion to recommit.

Quite frankly, this amendment is redundant, unnecessary, and another attempt to divert attention from the real issue of increasing energy production in order to create jobs, lower energy costs, and improve national security by lessening our dependence on foreign oil.

First, Mr. Speaker, exports are already subject to the Export Administration Act. Before any oil or gas can be exported, the President must find that the exports will not diminish the total quantity or quality of petroleum available to the U.S. and the national interests and are in accord with the provisions of the Export Administration Act of 1969. If the President finds that exports are in violation of the Export Administration Act, an executive order can halt all these exports if Congress finds that the exports are in conflict with the national interests, and they can act accordingly.

Now, having said it is covered under law, let's really get to the bottom line. This is another distraction from the same people that brought us cap-and-trade. Now, that should probably say everything right there because I find it absolutely ironic my good friend from New Mexico making this argument that if we went out and talked to our constituents if they would like to buy American-made energy, he suggested they would say overwhelmingly yes. Well, of course, they would. They would also say why aren't we drilling for sources here in the United States, offshore in the Gulf of Mexico and onshore; and that's what these three bills do.

So I urge my colleagues to vote against this motion to recommit and pass the bill.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Speaker, today the House considers the BP respill bills. That might not be what they are officially called, but it's a much more accurate title for this legislation. It's clear that the authors of these BP respill bills did not learn any lessons from the Deepwater Horizon disasters. These bills would make offshore drilling more dangerous for offshore workers, 11 of whom died on the Deepwater Horizon. These bills would make offshore drilling more dangerous for the environment, which was coated with 4.1 million barrels of oil along the Gulf Coast and is killing fish and wildlife in the area to this day as a result of BP's recklessness.

These bills would make offshore drilling more dangerous for our national security because they reinforce the complete myth that America can somehow drill our way out of dependence on oil. And these bills are more dangerous for the economy, risking destroying fishing and tourism jobs in affected areas.

But one thing these bills do not do is make filling up at the pump any more affordable at all for American families. According to the American Petroleum Institute itself, the main advocacy group for oil interests, even if we opened all Federal land to oil drilling, including offshore areas, including Alaska's wildlife refuge and all Federal land that is in the national parks, they can't even say that it would reduce gas prices or oil prices. In fact, the cheap oil analyst at the Oil Price Information Service, which calculates gas prices for AAA, the motorist organization, said: ``This drill, drill, drill thing is tired. It's a simplistic way of looking for a solution that doesn't exist.''

So if this legislation isn't about reducing the price at the pump, what is it about? It's about exploiting our legitimate concerns about high gas prices to deliver another huge giveaway to Big Oil, an industry that made over $35 billion in profits in the last quarter alone. Meanwhile, the majority refuses to end Big Oil's nearly $50 billion of special interest tax breaks.

Yesterday in the Rules Committee, Mr. McGovern brought forth a bill that would have ended the giveaway of tax revenue to Big Oil. Unfortunately, the Republican majority chose not to allow that amendment in this rule.

Had that been allowed under the open rule that Mr. McGovern proposed, I would have brought forth an amendment on the floor to use those $50 billion of revenue to reduce the corporate tax rate to help create jobs in America. Instead, the Republican majority is continuing to seek to keep American taxes high, to keep corporate taxes high, and this is another example of a job-destroying bill that keeps taxes high while picking winners and losers in the economy and using government subsidies to aid an industry that is one of our most profitable industries.

We should allow American businesses of all sizes to compete. The America corporate tax rate of 35 percent is higher than most of the rest of the world, which is why many companies continue to engage in operations overseas. If we can reduce it from 35 percent to 30 or 28 or 26 percent--and we could have done had Mr. McGovern's amendment passed in the Rules Committee yesterday, and that is one of the reasons I oppose this rule today--that would create an enormous engine of economic growth.

While frequently the Republicans give lip service to lower taxes, they continue to use special interest tax breaks to keep taxes high on small- and middle-sized American companies that don't have the same lobbyists here in Washington to lobby us for special interest tax breaks.

We know that Big Oil would rather do without the fuss of showing that they can drill safely; but that's what this bill, in fact, delivers. This legislation states that the Interior Secretary must act on any drilling permit within 60 days, or it's automatically approved. What should be a very serious process to ensure safe drilling, to ensure that there aren't further disasters, and to ensure that jobs are not destroyed turns into little more than a rubber stamp, a rubber stamp for the further degradation of our economy and of our environment.

The second bill this rule makes in order claims to restart the process, or issuing, of oil and gas leases. Now, what the majority is doing in this is essentially validating what the administration has already done. The administration has already restarted offshore drilling in February. In fact, the administration has announced plans to offer all three Gulf of Mexico lease sales that are mandated in this bill this year or early next year. Again, this particular policy is one that I don't agree with fully with the administration, but I am glad to see that the Republican majority is validating President Obama's leadership on this energy issue.

Together, these bills will not relieve pain at the pump, but they will increase the chances of another Deepwater Horizon disaster, costing lives, livelihoods, and hurting some of our precious natural resources. Why? Because that's what Big Oil wants. If Big Oil wants to keep taxes high for American companies, if Big Oil wants to destroy jobs, then the Republican majority is giving them that. In fact, even the problem the majority purports to be addressing with these bills, the speed of permitting in the gulf and restarting offshore oil drilling, doesn't even exist.

Here are the facts: Following the temporary pause on deepwater drilling last year, what Secretary Salazar listed in October, the oil industry wasn't able to demonstrate that it possessed the capacity to contain a deepwater blowout until February 2011. Once oil companies demonstrated that they had the capability to contain a blowout, the first permit was issued 11 days later, February 28, 2011. There have now been a total of 10 deepwater drilling permits issued since that time. In addition, there have been 39 shallow water permits approved since last October, matching the number from before the spill. Let me repeat that: matching the number of permits from before the spill. If anything, the majority, by acting through this bill, is effectively congratulating the administration on its leadership for speedily approving permits.

In addition, in the gulf region, the number of jobs that depend on tourism and fishing is five times the number of jobs related to the oil and gas industry. Gulf jobs related to oil and gas and other resource extraction total about 154,000. The total number of jobs for tourism and fishing are 777,000 jobs. So with this bill, the majority is putting at risk those 777,000 jobs for the benefit of 154,000. We should not put them at risk just to make the permitting process easier for Big Oil to exploit.

Passage of these bills is not good for the gulf coast's economy or its ecology, although it is best for Big Oil.

Again, while I appreciate the Republican majority's efforts to validate the leadership of President Obama on energy issues, this rule could be a lot better. Rather than keeping corporate taxes high, we could help make America more competitive by reducing corporate taxes and helping make American businesses more competitive, including the critical tourism and fishing industries in the gulf coast.

I reserve the balance of my time.

I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Rhode Island (Mr. Cicilline).

I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer).

Mr. Speaker, with regard to the subsidy issue, the simple fact of the matter is that the Republicans are not for free markets. But what they are for is Big Oil co-opting free markets. In fact, 70 percent of all energy-related subsidies go to fossil fuels like oil and coal. Less than 5 percent of subsidies go to renewable energies like wind and solar.

The gentleman from Utah pointed out that many of these subsidies help small drillers, and, in fact, that can be true. But it is easy to apply changes only to the Big Oil companies and not even affect independent producers.

There's simply no excuse not to end this corporate welfare which keeps taxes for all Americans who pay their taxes artificially high. In fact, at the same time that BP was reaping sizable tax benefits from leasing the Deepwater Horizon rig, it turned out that the company was using the tax break for the oil industry to write off 70 percent of the rent for Deepwater Horizon. That tax subsidy cost American taxpayers $225,000 a day since the lease for Deepwater Horizon began. And that's just one example of many.

I also want to address some misperceptions regarding President Obama's policies regarding oil resources. The Obama administration is allowing, on average, more drilling than the Bush administration did. In fact, the Obama administration approved more leases in 2010 than the Bush administration did in any year except one of his presidency.

Again, in moving forward and reissuing permits, which the administration has already begun to do, this bill helps validate President Obama's leadership on this issue.

The real issues at hand are the subsidies that the industry continues to receive. As long as we continue a policy of using taxpayer dollars to artificially pick winners and losers in the economy, the winner here being Big Oil, the loser being American taxpayers, we will continue to hurt energy security, destroy jobs, and continue to put our environment at risk.

I reserve the balance of my time.

I yield myself 30 seconds.

Mr. Speaker, if we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment to the rule to provide that, immediately after the House adopts this rule, we will bring up H.R. 1689, the Big Oil Welfare Repeal Act of 2011.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of the amendment in the Record, along with extraneous material, immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

The nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation, in its analysis of the administration's budget, stated that the repeal of oil and gas preferences are ``likely to have no effect on the world price of fossil fuels, and any increase in prices for domestically consumed fossil fuels are likely to be attenuated.''

Again, when we talk about ending the giveaway to Big Oil and Gas, it will have no effect with regard to actual energy prices.

Mr. Speaker, I am proud to yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California, the Democratic leader, Ms. Pelosi.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Markey), the ranking member of the Natural Resources Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson Lee).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Florida, a former member of the Rules Committee, Ms. Castor.

I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Holt), the ranking member of the Energy and Natural Resources Subcommittee.

I yield the gentleman an additional 15 seconds.

I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Keating).

Mr. Speaker, how much time remains?

I yield myself the balance of my time.

With regard to the last comment, it is the oil cartels that drive prices, not the normal functions of the market and supply and demand.

With regard to the oil subsidies, Mr. Speaker, we have an opportunity here today to see where the Republicans and the Democrats in the House stand on deficit reduction. Mr. Speaker, by defeating the previous question, we can and we will reduce the deficit by over $12.8 billion. We have the chance to have the discussion around the continuing resolution, around the budget, around deficit reduction. And here we have an opportunity, without impacting the price of oil, without impacting what consumers pay at the pump, to reduce the deficit by $12.8 billion by defeating the previous question. I think that's what the American people want to see.

The American people spoke out in the last election. Let's reduce the deficit. Let's work across the aisle to see what we can do to cut unnecessary government expenditures, to make those decisions to help make sure that we can leave something other than a legacy of debt to the next generation.

I think, Mr. Speaker, this is an easy one. Let's defeat the previous question and reduce the deficit by $12.8 billion.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to submit for the Record a document from the Treasury Department which states that the manufacturing deduction for oil and gas effectively provides a lower rate of tax with respect to a favored source of income. In fact, it distorts the market by encouraging more investment in the oil and gas industry than would occur under a neutral system.

Again, by returning to the free market, we are able to reduce the deficit by over $12.8 billion instead of having Big Government trying to pick winners and losers in the economy with regard to tax policy.

General Explanations of the Administration's Fiscal Year 2012 Revenue

Proposals--Department of the Treasury, February 2011

Repeal Domestic Manufacturing Deduction for Oil and Natural Gas

Companies

Current Law

A deduction is allowed with respect to income attributable

to domestic production activities (the manufacturing

deduction). For taxable years beginning after 2009, the

manufacturing deduction is generally equal to 9 percent of

the lesser of qualified production activities income for the

taxable year or taxable income for the taxable year, limited

to 50 percent of the W-2 wages of the taxpayer for the

taxable year. The deduction for income from oil and gas

production activities is computed at a 6 percent rate.

Qualified production activities income is generally

calculated as a taxpayer's domestic production gross receipts

(i.e., the gross receipts derived from any lease, rental,

license, sale, exchange, or other disposition of qualifying

production property manufactured, produced, grown, or

extracted by the taxpayer in whole or significant part within

the United States; any qualified film produced by the

taxpayer; or electricity, natural gas, or potable water

produced by the taxpayer in the United States) minus the cost

of goods sold and other expenses, losses, or deductions

attributable to such receipts.

The manufacturing deduction generally is available to all

taxpayers that generate qualified production activities

income, which under current law includes income from the

sale, exchange or disposition of oil, natural gas or primary

products thereof produced in the United States.

Reasons for Change

The President agreed at the G-20 Summit in Pittsburgh to

phase out subsidies for fossil fuels so that the United

States can transition to a 21st-century energy economy. The

manufacturing deduction for oil and gas effectively provides

a lower rate of tax with respect to a favored source of

income. The lower rate of tax, like other oil and gas

preferences the Administration proposes to repeal, distorts

markets by encouraging more investment in the oil and gas

industry than would occur under a neutral system. This market

distortion is detrimental to long-term energy security and is

also inconsistent with the Administration's policy of

supporting a clean energy economy, reducing our reliance on

oil, and cutting carbon pollution. Moreover, the tax subsidy

for oil and gas must ultimately be financed with taxes that

result in underinvestment in other, potentially more

productive, areas of the economy.

Proposal

The proposal would retain the overall manufacturing

deduction, but exclude from the definition of domestic

production gross receipts all gross receipts derived from the

sale, exchange or other disposition of oil, natural gas or a

primary product thereof for taxable years beginning after

December 31, 2011. There is a parallel proposal to repeal the

domestic manufacturing deduction for coal and other hard

mineral fossil fuels.

Mr. Speaker, I would also like to submit for the Record a July 3, 2010, New York Times article regarding oil subsidies.

Again, this talks of the oil subsidies that continue to benefit this industry to the detriment of the American taxpayer and to the detriment of future generations of Americans who will continue to suffer under an increasing mountain of debt unless we defeat the previous question here today.

[From NY Times, July 3, 2010]

On Subsidies

But an examination of the American tax code indicates that

oil production is among the most heavily subsidized

businesses, with tax breaks available at virtually every

stage of the exploration and extraction process.

According to the most recent study by the Congressional

Budget Office, capital investments like oil field leases and

drilling equipment are taxed at an effective rate of 9

percent, significantly lower than the overall rate of 25

percent for businesses in general and lower than virtually

any other industry.

And for many small and midsize oil companies, the tax on

capital investments is so low that it is more than eliminated

by various credits. These companies' returns on those

investments are often higher after taxes than before.

Efforts to curtail the tax breaks are likely to face fierce

opposition in Congress; the oil and natural gas industry has

spent $340 million on lobbyists since 2008, according to the

nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics, which monitors

political spending.

Some of the tax breaks date back nearly a century, when

they were intended to encourage exploration in an era of

rudimentary technology, when costly investments frequently

produced only dry holes. Because of one lingering provision

from the Tariff Act of 1913, many small and midsize oil

companies based in the United States can claim deductions for

the lost value of tapped oil fields far beyond the amount the

companies actually paid for the oil rights.

Other tax breaks were born of international politics. In an

attempt to deter Soviet influence in the Middle East in the

1950s, the State Department backed a Saudi Arabian accounting

maneuver that reclassified the royalties charged by foreign

governments to American oil drillers. Saudi Arabia and others

began to treat some of the royalties as taxes, which entitled

the companies to subtract those payments from their American

tax bills. Despite repeated attempts to forbid this

accounting practice, companies continue to deduct the

payments. The Treasury Department estimates that it will cost

$8.2 billion over the next decade.

Mr. Speaker, 1 year after the national tragedy of Deepwater Horizon, the majority party has decided not to address a single problem that led to this economic and environmental tragedy. Instead, the majority is pushing through these bills, simply rubber-stamping offshore drilling and maintaining taxpayer subsidies and giveaways to Big Oil, which increase the deficit.

During a Special Order speech just the other night, a Member on the other side of the aisle said all you need is an eighth grade understanding of supply and demand to understand why gas prices are high and how we can lower them by drilling more. Fortunately, for those of us who have more than an eighth grade education, like economists and other experts, we know that America cannot drill its way out of high gas prices. Even the American Petroleum Institute, the mouthpiece for Big Oil, is saying that we cannot drill our way out. ``Drill, Baby, Drill'' may look good as a bumper sticker, but it's not a serious energy policy.

I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on the bill and to defeat the previous question so we can reduce the deficit.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 245 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Polis), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.

General Leave

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks.

Mr. Speaker, House Resolution 245 provides for the consideration of two very important bills, H.R. 1229, the Putting the Gulf of Mexico Back to Work Act, and H.R. 1230, the Restarting American Offshore Leasing Now Act, both under a structured rule. With many amendments, all of which are Democrat amendments having been made in order, this is a very fair rule.

I commend the sponsor of the two bills, the chairman of the Natural Resources Committee, Mr. Hastings of Washington, for his leadership in bringing both of these bills to the House.

H.R. 1229 is a bill that goes to the heart of the bureaucratic delays, which are preventing the approval of drilling permits within the Gulf of Mexico; and it modifies the standards and procedures governing Federal leases and permits in order to streamline the process, making the development of these domestic resources a reality instead of the status quo of paying lip service to drilling and then stifling drilling through bureaucratic inaction.

H.R. 1230 is a bill that would direct the sale of oil and gas leases within the Outer Continental Shelf, reversing a failed administration policy of canceling and delaying those processes.

Mr. Speaker, over the last 2 years, many Republicans have come to this floor and have sung the same refrain of ``show us the jobs.'' It was, indeed, a nice song and a catchy tune--so catchy that the minority of today seems to have been picking up on that kind of song as well. I don't expect to hear that today, or at least we ought not to hear it today, because the two bills before us under this rule are real bills that create real jobs for people.

Unlike the bills we have seen over the past couple of years which have led us to a situation where today there are twice as many workers in the government as there are in all of manufacturing in this Nation, which is an exact reverse of the situation this Nation was in in 1960, these are not going to be government jobs which attack the taxpayers and suck the money out of their wallets to fund them. These are going to be real jobs that grow the private sector, that expand the economy, that provide wealth, and that will provide, actually, millions of new government revenues coming into this country.

The situation we find ourselves in today with regard to energy is one that is detrimental to everybody. Everyone who goes to the pump to fill their cars recognizes the cost is increasing and will continue to increase. They recognize that the situation we are in puts all our jobs in jeopardy, and it is because of the inaction of this particular administration. The President has continually said that he wants to do action, to move forward, to develop American energy, but the actions of his administration have, quite frankly, failed to meet the rhetoric of the administration.

The problem has always been a fundamental flaw in our Nation's energy plan. Last May, the Deepwater Horizon accident occurred, which was a tragedy; and we must thank all of those who helped to solve that particular problem; but, unfortunately, the administration's response to that tragedy has turned it into a catastrophe and one which destroys jobs.

Immediately, a moratorium on all sorts of development was put into place. Prior to that moratorium being put into place, there were 52 approved and pending permits, and that moratorium was lifted in October; but of those 52, only 10 permits have been issued since that time. Two of them are new in deepwater and are eight of the 52 that were originally done. That means there are over 40 still approved and still stalled in what has become a de facto moratorium, caused by a foot-dragging of this administration that, what one columnist said, is moving at a glacial pace. More rigs have left our shore--12--to go to other places in the world where they are welcomed and where they are developing energy sources, where they don't have to face the red tape and the foot-dragging than have actually been approved by this administration.

A perfect example is Seahawk Drilling, a company that had over 500 jobs and 20 rigs that went into chapter 11 bankruptcy. The president of that company stated only one reason for that bankruptcy and that loss of jobs, which was the de facto moratorium of inaction done by this administration in this area in 2008 in a response to an arbitrary drilling ban that was lifted by both the President and Congress. It created a 5-year plan. Virginia was supposed to start the exploration process in 2011, but the Secretary of the Interior delayed that until 2012 and then later delayed all exploration on the Atlantic coast until after 2017.

In the Gulf of Mexico, two other sales were canceled and moved out from this year, which was when they were supposed to begin, once again into next year. It became so bad that a judge in New Orleans gave the administration 30 days to start moving on these projects, saying that what was happening by this administration was increasingly inexcusable and that not acting at all is not a lawful action.

The result of this has simply been catastrophic for jobs in America. The Obama administration has admitted in its official memorandum that, for those days of its official moratorium, 12,000 jobs were lost; but what is more significant is the de facto moratorium there. An LSU study simply said, if this were sustained for 18 months in the gulf area, there would be 24,532 jobs lost and in the Nation 36,137 jobs lost simply because of what we are not doing in the Gulf of Mexico.

It is very simple to understand how this works. Each platform that is out there drilling has 90 to 150 employees. If you add the production team as well as the exploration team, you can multiply that by a factor of four. So you have almost per every drilling up to 1,400 jobs that are tied to that particular project with $1,800 a week as the average wage.

That means for every one of those drills that is not put back into production, it is $5 million to $10 million per month per platform that is lost to this economy; and the ripple effect within the economy for our energy uses as well as jobs is, once again, staggering as this administration is, indeed, going at a glacial pace. In Virginia alone, 2,000 jobs will be estimated to be lost if the de facto moratorium that pushes everything to 2017 is allowed to take place.

Now, this action, or inaction, by the administration costs every American. It costs us at the gas pump as we see the cost of running our cars increasing almost daily, and this hurts the poor worse than anyone else. It is estimated that every American will pay $700 more this year for gasoline than least year. Obviously, those at the lower end of the economic scale are the ones who are hurt the most. For every cent that is increased in gas at the pump, that is $1 billion that is taken out of household incomes in this country; and it makes sure that Americans are then put at the mercy of foreign oil development and foreign energy sources, which may not necessarily like us, and sometimes they're just flat out bad guys.

It also has other areas in which it has affected everyone--once again, those at the lower end of the income scale the most. For every dime that diesel goes up, that is $400 million that is added to the agricultural industry, which is what we eat, which is tacked onto our food prices. You have to have oil for fertilizer. As that goes up, the cost of fertilizer goes up; the cost of running machinery goes up; the cost of food goes up; the cost of pharmaceuticals, plastics. If you go into the emergency room, everything that is not metal has some element of oil that developed it, and all of those are increasing.

Now, there are only two ways that we can handle this situation. First, you can go with the old concept of supply and demand and simply increase production, which is what these two bills are trying to do; or you can go to the approach that this administration seems to be asking us to do, which is to cut our standard of living, accept gasoline prices at the European level, and beg Saudi Arabia to be nice to us--to put our futures in the hands of OPEC and then amazingly say we can also solve these problems simply by taxing oil companies at a higher rate.

Since 2010, the domestic production of energy in this country has decreased 16 percent. In this year, next year and the year after that, we estimate, unless we make changes, that a quarter of a million barrels of oil will be decreased in our production rate in each of those years. The only area in which any energy production has been increasing is on private property. Unfortunately for this country, almost all of the energy that we have, most of the energy that we can develop, is on public lands, which is controlled by the government, which is doing nothing now to help develop that.

This is a time where pragmatism is much better than a failed ideology of restrictions. Now, what these two bills do is to simply reverse the job-killing delays that have been taking place. In H.R. 1229, it reforms the law to require leaseholders to receive permits to drill before they start drilling; and it will do it for the first time by law, not simply by a regulation. It demands that the Secretary of the Interior conduct and approve safety revenues, once again, for the first time in history.

More importantly, it ends the de facto moratorium by demanding prompt guidelines and action. It says that the Secretary of the Interior will have 30 days in which to deal with these issues and then can have up to two 15-day extensions--a total of 60 days to do the review.

Now, while that may seem to some as a quick path, it's not when you look at the history of what has been done. Before the moratorium went into effect, it was taking 5 to 15 days to do the drilling leases and permits.

One company was done in nine days just recently. What the problem is is that most of these are simply not being done simply because of inaction. It also says for those that were approved prior to the May 27 moratorium, you've got 30 days to get them going again. This is plenty of time to do the work.

It also does something else for the first time. It provides an expedited hearing process so that legal rights are not lost--they are protected--but you will not go back into a concept of a never-ending lawsuit moratorium.

In 1230, the bill recognizes that this year will be the first time since 1958 that we have a possibility of no offshore lease sales. And it wants to reverse that action to proceed promptly with the 5-year plan so that things, for example, in Virginia will be in effect within 1 year, and those that were scheduled in the gulf can be done within 1 year of the passage of this bill.

This bill simply will create billions in Federal Reserve revenues coming in, and it will create billions in our economy, and it will create jobs.

I hate to say this, but under President Obama, the cost of energy has skyrocketed. The administration has actively blocked and delayed energy production. It's cost jobs. It's raised energy prices. It's made the United States more reliant on unstable foreign countries for our energy. Through the American Energy Initiative, this House is actively working to increase American energy production to lower gas prices, to create American jobs, to generate revenue to help reduce the deficit, and to decrease our dependence on foreign energy.

The United States Government has had a long history of sporadic attempts to respond to oil and gas prices. Usually, we have missed the mark. But, unfortunately, oil is still the lifeblood of the world and will be for most of our lives. That is why 70 countries and 31 States in the United States are involved in the process. Prices are influenced by the signals that are given by worldwide circumstances and also by government policy.

These two bills are the first of several signals that this House wants to send to the world and to the economy that says our goal should be to come as close to economic and energy self-sufficiency and independence as possible. We are not an energy-poor Nation; and we need to be developing the resources in every way possible, including in the gulf, including in the Outer Continental Shelf, and including on our land sources. That is our future if we want to do anything to create jobs and help the American people. That is specifically what these two bills are aimed to do.

With such, Mr. Speaker, this is a good rule and a fair rule; and the underlying piece of legislation is entirely worthy of our support.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, let me just make a couple of very quick points, if I could.

Once again, the purpose of these two bills is to start our process going towards Americans having adequate energy supplies to live their lives. And it's one of the things that you either increase production or you try to cut back. Our goal is to increase the production.

The idea that what we are doing is in some way making safety less significant is silly. There are new safety rules that have been in place. They are ready. They are prepared. They are ready to go forward.

The myth of subsidies to Big Oil is one of the things also that we need to talk about because even my fellow Democrats have admitted that the President's plan to push a tax hike on energy taxes does result in the loss of American jobs and higher taxes on independent oil and gas companies.

I love the fact that we always spin things by talking about Big Oil. But the nonpartisan Politifact.com noted that a majority of the U.S. oil production comes not from the biggest multinational oil companies but from independent firms. American production activities are dominated by these independent producers who drill 95 percent of the Nation's natural gas and oil wells, accounting for as much as 67 percent of the total U.S. natural gas and oil production.

Often we try to find some kind of straw man which to attack, and the idea of Big Oil is one of those easiest ones to do. But in reality, if those tax hikes were to go into place on production, you would not be hitting the Big Oil companies; you're going to be hitting small companies which have 100 or fewer employees, not only offshore, but on the shore as well. That is the attack.

I'm sorry. I am not validating President Obama's leadership on this issue. To me, leadership means you do something. Inaction is not leadership.

It's not the government picking winners and losers. What this administration is doing by the de facto moratorium, the inability to move forward on this issue is simply picking losers, losers in the field, losers for America, losers in jobs, and that is wrong.

This tries to get us going ahead in an area and in a way in which we can do it, we should do it, we have the capability of doing it. All we simply need to do is do it.

I reserve the balance of my time.

For the moment I will reserve the balance of my time and enjoy the spin.

I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Fleming).

I yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds.

I am pleased to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Scalise), who lives in this area and understands the situation firsthand.

I yield the gentleman 1 additional minute.

I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert).

I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Landry). He is a member of the Resources Committee that provides a great deal of insight from his personal background.

I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Duncan), another great new member of the Resources Committee.

I yield myself the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, the minority is asking us to walk down a tangent issue by using negative cue words like ``subsidy,'' so let me walk down that for 30 seconds.

Please realize the U.S. oil and natural gas industry does not receive subsidized payments from the government. The word ``subsidy'' is inaccurate. Tax deductions should in no way be confused with the concept of subsidies. There are, though, tax deductions that go to all industries. Section 199, which has been talked about by the Democrats, is the domestic manufacturers'

deduction. Every industry--manufacturing, producing, growing, extracting--gets a 9 percent of earned income deduction, not a credit, except for oil and gas; but they are limited to just 6 percent. There is similarity.

They've also asked us to try and walk down a tangent in talking about safety, but the ideas of safety are codified in the legislation before us. They then say let's increase our production by raising taxes. What a non sequitur. Even if you raise taxes against somebody else and try to create some kind of straw man to attack, that is simply a non sequitur, because we do not have a tax problem in this country. We have a production problem; we have a jobs problem. These two bills go directly to that problem. They increase production and increase jobs.

We are not trying to pick winners and losers. We want the Americans to be winners, and that's what our choice is to be. These are two good bills in a time of $4 and $5 gasoline prices that are devastating jobs and our economy. These bills surely should be something that every Member should support.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution.

I yield myself such time as I may consume.

One year ago today, we were 2 weeks into the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. We were 2 weeks into what would ultimately become the worst environmental disaster in our Nation's history, with more than 4 million barrels of oil spilling into the Gulf. And since that disaster, we have learned many things about the safety of offshore drilling.

We learned that the blowout preventer that the oil industry touted as fail-safe could in fact be sure to fail if an actual blowout was under way. We learned that the only technology the oil industry had been relying upon in the event of a spill was a Xerox machine. The spill response plans for major companies were so similar that they contained plans to evacuate walruses from the Gulf of Mexico even though the walruses had not called the Gulf home in more than 3 million years. And they were such dead ringers for each other that they contained the same name and phone number of the same long-deceased expert.

We learned that the oil companies had neither the resources nor the ability to stop a deepwater blowout. BP spill response included an attempt to shoot golf balls and bits of rubber into the well. When we were told that the industry was relying on the most sophisticated technologies, we assumed that they meant technologies developed by MIT and not the PGA.

And we learned from an independent BP spill commission that the root causes of the Deepwater Horizon disaster were ``systemic'' to the entire oil and gas industry.

And yet here we are debating legislation that would do nothing to improve the safety of offshore drilling and could actually make drilling less safe. The legislation before us represents a return to the pre-spill mentality of speed over safety.

H.R. 1230 would force the Interior Department to rush to hold new lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico by ``deeming'' the shoddy environmental analysis conducted by the Bush administration's Mineral Management Service before the BP spill as sufficient for future lease sales in the Gulf.

Just looking at some of the conclusions contained within the Bush administration's 2007 environmental analysis exposes the absurdity of deeming this work as sufficient for new leasing in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon disaster.

In its 2007 multisale Environmental Impact Statement completed in April of 2007, the Interior Department determined, ``The most likely size of an offshore spill greater than or equal to 1,000 barrels that is predicted to occur is 4,600 barrels'' of oil. The BP Deepwater Horizon disaster led to more than 4 million barrels spilling into the Gulf. That is 1,000 times the size of the largest spill this analysis concluded was likely to occur.

In 2007, MMS analysis concluded that the total volume of oil that would be spilled from all spills in the central and western Gulf over the next 40 years would be roughly 47,000 barrels of oil. That is less than what was spilled in the Deepwater Horizon in 1 day.

MMS concluded that, in 2007, a worst-case scenario, only 19 to 31 miles of Gulf coastline would be impacted by a spill. The Deepwater Horizon disaster resulted in oil reaching over 950 miles of Gulf coastline.

And MMS determined that a deepwater blow-off would not present a cleanup problem because the oil would rise in the water column, surfacing almost directly over the source location, but in fact the oil spewing from the ocean floor remained in enormous subsurface plumes that spread across the Gulf.

The Obama administration is already moving forward to hold these lease sales in the Gulf later this year and early next year, and they are going to be more responsible. Even the Congressional Budget Office analysis of H.R. 1230 concludes, ``CBO estimates that implementing the bill would have no significant impact on proceeds from lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico because the proposed schedule is similar to the plan included in the DOI's budget for 2011.''

So, really, all the majority is accomplishing with this legislation is ensuring that we don't do any new environmental review of the impacts of these lease sales. Instead of actually reviewing the lessons of the BP spill, the majority wants to lessen the environmental review.

In addition, this legislation would force the Department to move forward with a lease off of the coast of Virginia within one year. Well, I have very bad news for the majority. The overwhelming majority of the area that would comprise this lease sale would infringe on critical training areas for the U.S. Navy. The Department of Defense concluded that 78 percent of the area offered in the Virginia lease sale would occur where military operations would be impeded by drilling structures and related activities. Moreover,

much of the remaining area is comprised of a major shipping channel.

This bill is really a solution in search of a problem. The bottom line is that oil production is at its highest level in nearly a decade and natural gas production is at record levels. We should instead be debating legislation that would protect the lives and the livelihoods of the people in the Gulf and that could actually help consumers at the pump this summer.

I reserve the balance of my time.

I yield 2 minutes to the ranking member of the subcommittee, the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Holt).

I yield the gentleman 30 additional seconds.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran).

I yield 2 minutes to the gentlelady from Santa Barbara, California (Mrs. Capps).

I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Vermont (Mr. Welch).

I yield myself 3 minutes.

This is the wrong debate to be having here today. The Republicans are debating more drilling without more safety even though the BP spill commission that examined what went wrong last year concluded that there was a ``systemic'' failure in our country to deal with the safety issues that confront the offshore drilling industry. In fact, they concluded that there are four times greater fatalities in drilling for oil off the shores of the United States than there are in Europe--four times more fatalities. We should be number one in drilling but we should be number one in safety as well.

What the Republicans are doing here today is they are saying that they believe in ``all of the above.'' But the truth is that with this bill they are saying once again it is really an agenda of ``oil above all.'' They have nothing out here on renewable energy resources--wind, solar, biomass, geothermal, plug-in hybrids, all-electric vehicles. None of that is part of their debate. They just go back to the same old agenda of oil above all.

And do we need to give more to the oil industry? We have $10 billion in profits for ExxonMobil in January, February, and March--$10 billion they made. Shell, $8 billion; BP, $7 billion; Chevron, $6 billion; ConocoPhillips, $3 billion. Shouldn't we talk a little bit about safety as we're talking about new drilling off of our shorelines? But no, that's not the Republican agenda.

Should we be talking about taking away the tax breaks from the oil industry, the $40 billion which the American taxpayer gives to the oil industry? Do we really need to have the oil industry in the consumers' pocket at the gas pump and then in their other pocket as taxpayers to give even more money to ExxonMobil? That's what the Republicans should bring out here for a debate. They do not do that.

The New York Mercantile Exchange, that's where they trade for oil futures. Computerized Program Trading is now 45 percent of the oil futures trading on the commodities-futures trading floor of the New York Mercantile Exchange.

What do the Republicans do to deal with the fact that it has turned into a crude oil casino where gambling is going on as the speculators of our country and the world look at Saudi Arabia, look at Libya, as the price of oil skyrockets, as Goldman Sachs concludes that $20 a barrel in the increase of the price of oil just comes from the speculation, from the gambling that's going on in the NYMEX? You might as well put ``Las Vegas'' over the New York Mercantile Exchange. It is a crude oil casino, ladies and gentlemen. What do the Republicans do? They have slashed the budget for the Commodities Futures Trading Commission, who are the cops on the beat. They're

saying we need fewer cops to police these speculators. They slash the wind and solar budget by 70 percent in their budget that just passed last month.

I yield myself an additional 30 seconds.

This is their agenda. Nothing on safety; nothing on wind and solar; nothing on corralling the speculators. And what do they say? What they say is they're going to in fact go into the Medicare budget of Grandma and Grandpa and cut their programs and then put an oil rig on top of Medicare to suck out the money like a pipeline out of the pockets of Grandma and Grandpa and put it into the profits of the oil industry with more tax breaks for them, even as they report the greatest profits in the history of any companies in the history of the world.

Ladies and gentlemen, vote ``no'' on this legislation.

I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Connolly).

I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Washington State (Mr. Inslee).

(Mr. INSLEE asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Holt).

I would defer to the chairman of the committee. If he is the concluding speaker on his side, I am prepared to close on our side.

I yield myself the balance of my time.

So here's where we are. Republicans take over, Republicans say they're ready to put together a plan for our country. It's 1 year after the BP catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico, the worst environmental disaster in our Nation's history.

Last year, the Republicans blocked passage of any safety legislation that would learn the lessons of what happened in the Gulf of Mexico. The BP spill commission has come back. They now say that fatalities on U.S. rigs are four times higher than those on European rigs. We should be number one in drilling, and we should be number one in safety. The Republicans refuse to deal with the endemic, systemic problems with safety that have been identified in the American oil industry.

The oil industry is now garnering the largest profits any corporations in the world have ever been able to enjoy, but the Republicans refuse to bring out here legislation which will take away their tax breaks. Oil companies don't need to have tax breaks to do something they are doing anyway. It's like subsidizing a fish to swim or a bird to fly. We don't have to give them taxpayers' money. The Ryan budget slashes benefits for grandma and grandpa, then takes that money and gives it away in tax breaks to millionaires and to the oil industry. Do we really need to tell grandma we're cutting back on her medicare benefits and then taking that money and giving it in oil breaks to the biggest companies in our country? They don't need tax breaks.

And finally, what we should be talking about is the deployment of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. The Strategic Petroleum Reserve was used by both President Bushes. It was used by President Clinton. It does work. The New York Mercantile Exchange is where oil futures are traded. It is a casino of crude oil right now. On one day back just 2 months ago, 45 percent of all of the oil futures trades were computer- generated trades. Those trades were twice the value of all of the oil consumed in the world on a single day. That's what we need to do, to deal with those speculators. And the way to do it is what we have done in the past, deploy the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, deploy it now. Send the fear of losing fortunes into the hearts of those speculators, and you will see the price of oil drop like a rock. That's what we need to do. That's what the consumers need as they are heading into the Memorial Day weekend. That's what people all across our country are wondering--what is going to happen to our economy?

Ten of the last 11 recessions in our country are tied to the rise in the price of oil. That is 10 of the last 11 recessions, ladies and gentlemen. What we saw in 1990 was, President Bush won the war in Iraq in '90 and '91, but because he never deployed the Strategic Petroleum Reserve until it was too late, a mini-recession went through our economy, and President Clinton was able to defeat him. Let's learn this lesson of the link between the rise in the price of oil and recessions that are created in our economy. Deploy the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. Ignore this agenda of the Republican Party.

I thank the gentleman from New Jersey very much, and I thank him for his leadership on these issues. We're partners in this effort to try to move toward a new energy direction.

So last week we had a debate on the issue of whether or not the $4 billion

that the oil industry gets in tax breaks per year from the American consumer should be taken away at this time when ExxonMobil reported $10 billion worth of profits in the first quarter, that is just January, February and March. Shell reported $8.8 billion; BP, $7.1 billion; Chevron, $6.2 billion; ConocoPhillips, $3 billion. That's in the first 3 months of this year.

But you know what the argument is, from the Republican side, is that they would be punished if the consumer, if the taxpayer didn't also give them an additional $4 billion in tax breaks.

So let's just look at this chart. This is how much they made as people are pulling up to the pump paying $3.80, $4, $4.20 all across America. Now, you know what the oil companies could do? They could say, You know what? I think we made too much. I think what we should do in the first quarter is just lower the price at the pump so we don't make so much. Maybe we don't have to have the consumer paying $4 a gallon. Maybe we, ExxonMobil, maybe we could have made 9.7. Maybe Shell could have made 7.8, maybe BP could have made only $6.1 billion, maybe Chevron could have made only $5.2 billion. In other words, maybe they each could have made $1 billion less, and that would be $4 billion in the first quarter.

But, no. They decide that if the war in Libya is going to take 1.2 million barrels of oil off the market, if the Saudi Arabians are going to take 800,000 barrels of oil off the market, that that's a free market. And so if the price goes up to skyrocketing heights, we have a right to take all that extra money out of the consumers' pockets. That's the free market. The war in Libya is a free market. Saudi Arabia taking 800,000 barrels off the market, that's a free market.

Now, the American consumer, they look at it and they say that's not a free market. The American taxpayers, they look at it and they say that's not the free market. We're sending over more bombers. We're sending over more troops. We're adding more to the defense budget of the country. Why would we do that? What does that have to do with the free market? What does this increase in defense expenditures and the number of young men and women that we send over to the Middle East to protect this cordon of oil tankers coming into the United States have to do with the free market?

But nonetheless, that's the argument of the Republicans and, by the way, of ExxonMobil and Shell and BP. They deserve these profits, they say, just for 3 months.

By the way, you can multiply each one of these numbers by at least four, at least the next three quarters of 2011 as well, and project ExxonMobil making $40 billion this year and Shell 34 or $35 billion, et cetera, et cetera.

But the Republicans say they still need the extra $4 billion from the taxpayer pocket. So they dip into one pocket, the consuming pocket, and they tip the consumer upside down, and they take all this money out of their pockets. And you don't see any restraint on the part of the oil companies taking advantage of the war in Libya. And then they want to dip into the other pocket of the consumer, the consumer as a taxpayer, and then they say you can't take away those tax breaks either.

So that's a very interesting position to have to defend at this point in time, especially since they're saying that they want to cut back on the benefits for Grandma on Medicare. They want to cut back the budget by 70 percent on wind and solar, on geothermal and biomass. They want to cut back the budget to help Grandma stay in a nursing home with Alzheimer's.

But one thing you should never touch, and that's the $4 billion for ExxonMobil, Shell and BP from the taxpayers, even as they're reporting the largest profits in the history of the world that any corporation's made.

And now, today, they have the temerity to come out here on the floor and they're looking for more. What this first bill that we're about to consider does is it legislates possible intimidation of Federal safety reviewers and puts a time clock on looking at the most controversial leases.

Now, mind you, just 1 year ago in the Gulf of Mexico we were looking with amazement at the worst single environmental disaster in American history, and that is BP with no idea about how they were going to stop 4 million barrels of oil going into the Gulf of Mexico. They had no idea how to stop it. And the American people, the world was tuned into the spill cam, almost, you know, fixated on this complete lack of safety, complete lack of preparation to protect the life and the livelihoods of the people who live around the Gulf of Mexico.

So what's the response of the Republican Party 1 year later? Is it to pass a safety bill? Is it to implement the recommendations of the BP Spill Commission, this blue ribbon panel of experts that identified that there are systemic failures in the safety precautions built into drilling in the United States? Is it to deal with the fact that they identified that there are four times higher fatalities on American rigs as there are on European rigs drilling off the shores of Europe?

No. All that legislation is stopped dead in its tracks. What they argue is we have got to give, you know, kind of a shot clock. You know how in the NBA, when you're watching TV and you only have 24 seconds to shoot a basketball, and so that creates a real intensity or else you lose the ball? Well, that's kind of what they want to say now to the Department of the Interior. We're putting you on a shot clock. You have 60 days. You have 60 days to decide: Is that drilling rig safe? Have the precautions been put in place to ensure that a catastrophic accident can't happen?

And if you don't make a decision in 60 days, Department of the Interior, on a rig that's out there at 3,000 or 5,000 or 10,000 feet and off the shore miles and miles and you can't figure it out, Department of the Interior--now, mind you, this is the same company that couldn't figure it out a year ago, and they're amongst the wealthiest companies in the world. But if you, the Department of the Interior, if you can't figure out what we can do, we the company can do in 60 days, we get to have the lease and we get to go ahead.

It is kind of like the NBA, except the consequences aren't that your home team loses; it's that your home team loses its job, your home team loses its environment because another catastrophic accident has occurred. That's what they do with this bill. They put a shot clock on it.

So I think if the American people are looking at the absurdity of this situation with these companies, look at the companies that are lobbying for this: ExxonMobil, Shell, BP, Chevron, and ConocoPhillips. These are the companies that 1 year ago said that they could evacuate walruses from the Gulf of Mexico. They had an emergency response plan in the event of a spill. Well, the problem was, of course, that they each had put it in writing; they had each put it in as an application to the Department of the Interior to drill in the Gulf of Mexico. But walruses, as every sixth grade child knows, have not lived in the Gulf of Mexico for 3 million years. So these are the companies that we are now supposed to trust.

Put it on a shot clock, they say. Just let the Department of the Interior try to figure out everything that we are planning for Florida, Alabama, Louisiana, Texas.

And, by the way, the way the gulf stream works is pulling a lot of that pollution, if it's bad, in God knows how many directions, and the fish that get exposed to it put into the food chain with endocrine disrupters, cancer-causing agents, potentially harming families. But 60 days is all you have got.

It's kind of like the NBA, when we think that's how oil drilling should be, too, because we trust these companies. They are obviously the most safety conscious companies that this world has ever known, because we can see how really responsible they are in dealing with consumers.

They had a chance not to charge $4 a gallon because we are having a war in Libya and the Saudi Arabians took 800 barrels off the market, believe it or not, our friends the Saudis, over the last 6 weeks. But now we are just going to pretend that they are really good and responsible companies, and for them, so they can get all the leases that they want, they are on a shot clock--60 days.

Good luck to the Department of the Interior. Good luck to the environment. Good luck to the consumer.

Good luck to the taxpayers if another accident occurs.

So, ladies and gentlemen, we are going to have an incredible debate here on this issue, because these are the same people that just passed the budget that cut the wind and solar budget by 70 percent.

You know, if you are a kid in America and it is 2011 and you are looking at this debate, you're saying to yourself: They cut the solar and wind budget in 2011 by 70 percent, and they are giving the oil companies unlimited profits, unlimited tax breaks, and unlimited access after 60 days to wherever they want to drill off of the coastline? Now, that's an upside-down agenda.

And you have already heard some of the denigrating comments about wind and solar, which does reflect, I hate to say it, a deep-seated attitude about these renewable energy resources. But, you know, politics.

And I think America is all about the future, and the future is about wind. It's about solar. It's about moving to all electric vehicles. It's about the agenda that they just pretty much defunded in their budget that they had the votes here on the House floor.

So I would urge that we would defeat this piece of legislation.

And their legislation, they say it's all of the above, but do you want to know what it is? It's oil above all. That is really what it is all about. Give the oil companies everything they want, and slash the budget for renewables. Slash the budget for all the other new technologies that we need to enhance our future.