Lisa Murkowski: “I have listened to the Senator from Louisiana. I look forward to being a cosponsor of her amendment. For far too long…”

“I have listened to the Senator from Louisiana. I look forward to being a cosponsor of her amendment. For far too long, we have not identified the issue of equity which the Senator from Louisiana has certainly shown with her chart. I have a slightly bigger chart which basically shows the same thing. I will take a few moments, if I may. I ask the Senator from Louisiana to look at this chart. As she displayed on her own chart, the areas that are off limits for oil and gas exploration are clearly the entire east coast of the United States, from Maine to Florida. This is the entire area in gray. Then we have the area of lease sale 181 that was addressed by the Senators from the States of jurisdiction. I respect the attitude prevailing within those States relative to what happens off their shores. The entire west coast of the United States is off limits, from Washington to California. The Senator from Louisiana did not show what happened in the overthrust belt, where we have the producing States of Colorado, Wyoming, Montana, Utah, northern parts of New Mexico; they have been taken basically off limits by the roadless policy, as has a lot of public land. As we begin to look at this country, we recognize who produces the energy: Texas; Louisiana; Mississippi; Alabama, to a degree; California is still a major producer; Montana; my State of Alaska. But the inconsistency, as the Senator from Louisiana pointed out, is that we have an inequity.”