Political Quotes

“I simply care about the Senate too much to see it be a party to a deliberate scheme by just 5 percent of the oil companies to underpay their royalty payments to our constituents. The Hutchison amendment allows the situation to continue by stopping the Interior Department from fixing it. How do we know taxpayers are being cheated? First, there are many whistleblowers, former oil executives, who say under oath they undervalued the oil from Federal lands in order to pay less. Second, settlements are occurring all over the country whereby these oil companies are paying billions of dollars in back royalties to keep their cases out of court. Senator Hutchison has said the Interior Department wants to raise taxes on the oil companies. Royalties are not taxes; they are legal agreements just as your mortgage or rent is. As USA Today says: Imagine if one day you decided to lower your rent by 10 percent. No individual could do that. And yet the oil companies are. You may hear all we need is more time, but this is the fourth rider this Senate has passed, although we have never had a vote on it before. This is the first vote. We have already lost $88 million from the Department of the Interior because of it. These companies should do what 95 percent of them are already doing, base their royalty payments on fair market value.”