Bill Pascrell: “I have a great deal of respect for Chairman Hastings. He's a fair, civil individual. But this bill is off the charts. At…”

“I have a great deal of respect for Chairman Hastings. He's a fair, civil individual. But this bill is off the charts. At least the last one that we voted on had some redeeming qualities--some redeeming qualities. We know there's more oil been produced in the last 3\1/2\ years. The increase is greater than the previous 20 years. So you're trying to target the administration, and the administration can speak for itself and defend itself, but this is not right. This is not right. This is not right. So let's talk about this. I am opposed to this legislation. This bill would completely rewrite the administration's plan for offshore leasing in a reckless and irresponsible manner. For example, this bill would force the Secretary of the Interior to conduct lease sale 220, located off the shore of Virginia, 70 miles from the beaches of my home State of New Jersey. Now, look, a lot of the folks that are going to vote for this bill voted against even helping those people in New Jersey respond to the Sandy storm. You know it, and I know it. And here we are on the floor perpetrating untruths about why this is needed now. Look, it's not the amount of land that we've set aside on water or on land for oil exploration and production. We've got plenty of oil coming out of the ground. We don't have any refineries, and this is the same debate we had 25 years ago. How dare anybody stand in this astute body and then claim we don't care if gas prices go up.…”