Blog - Articles Tagged 'oil drilling'

Senate Republicans may be using a faulty argument about gas prices going up if we end oil subsidies as an excuse for protecting some of their biggest corporate donors, but Democrats don't seem to be taking the issue much more seriously. By bringing up a bill to end subsidies and effectively increase the corporate tax rate on U.S. oil companies, they're only setting up a campaign talking point, not doing actual policy work. The bill is flat-out unconstitutional, and they know it.

The Senate is set to begin debate this afternoon on the Close Big Oil Tax Loopholes Act. The bill repeal five tax breaks that Congress has enacted over the years to encourage oil companies to drill off of America's shorelines, and it would close a loophole that U.S. oil companies have been using to disguise foreign royalty payments as taxes and deduct them from their domestic tax bill. All savings would be used to balance the budget and pay down the debt. Despite expert analysis showing that the bill would not increase gas prices and may actually increase domestic oil production, Republicans are planning to vote against it. 

As you may have noticed in my preview post this morning, the Republican leadership is doing something few House leaders ever do -- opening up one of their bills to several floor amendments from the minority party and none from their own party. The Rules Committee last week decided that one of the Republicans' oil drilling bills, the H.R.1229 (a.k.a. the "Putting the Gulf of Mexico Back to Work Act") would be debated under a structured rule that makes in order eleven Democratic amendments for votes and ten minutes of debate each. Below is a rundown of the amendments that will be voted on -- I'll update with vote results when they are posted: 

The House comes back into session tomorrow to vote on more bills to expand domestic oil drilling, and, later in the week, on reauthorizing the nation's intelligence programs. The drilling bills are supposed to be serious responses to the recent gas-price bubble, though none of them have been designed with passing the Democratic Senate in mind, and increasing domestic drilling would not lower gas prices in the short term anyways. Probably not much in the long term either. The Senate meanwhile is stuck without much to do after the Republicans last week filibustered the small business jobs bill to death. They'll start off the week with some judicial nominees. No hints yet as to what's in store for later in the week as Majority Leader Sen. Harry Reid [D, NV] did not file any cloture petitions on legislation before adjourning last week. Here's a closer look at the House's schedule: