Alan Lowenthal: “I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, my amendment would strike a misguided policy rider that could…”

“I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, my amendment would strike a misguided policy rider that could cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars, and it maintains a sweetheart, below-market deal for the fossil fuel industry. My amendment would strike section 440 of the underlying bill, a section that would prevent the Interior Department from updating royalty rates and valuation methodologies for coal, oil, and natural gas resources on public lands. Now, I would think that saving the taxpayer money by charging a fair return for the development of our public resources is something that both sides of the aisle could agree upon. So maybe the sponsors behind this policy rider didn't know the true magnitude of the cost to taxpayers that their rider to this appropriations bill would impose upon Americans. To make sure that we all understand, Mr. Chair, what we would be costing the taxpayer if we were to vote to keep this harmful rider, Mr. Chair, I would like to share some eye-opening research on this matter. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, the CBO, just released in April a detailed study that reviewed possible changes to the oil and gas fiscal system. That report explicitly analyzed how much money the American taxpayer is losing from the current below-market onshore oil and gas royalty rates. CBO concluded that the U.S.…”