On the recordDecember 17, 2015
I thank the gentleman for yielding. I urge Members to defeat the previous question because I am not sure that the majority has fully considered the permanent damage to jobs and to national security if this is not properly transitioned and implemented. It was not too long ago that many of us in this room remember what we call the odd-even days where we were waiting in long lines, just hoping that we could get gasoline. Well, we have come a long way from there through technology and the ability to extract more oil. We made a strategic investment in American energy. We have refineries on the West Coast. We have them on the East Coast. We have them in the Gulf. That is critical to our national security because oil, without refining, simply doesn't work. So here we are today looking at lifting the 40-year-old oil ban. What this really means is jobs and, in particular, this means jobs and a strategic disadvantage to the East Coast where we will be losing many of our refineries. When it comes to very difficult times in this country, we need that capacity. We have the natural resource called oil, but if we don't have it in the refining sense on the East Coast, on the West Coast, and in the Gulf, we will be putting ourselves at a very strategic disadvantage. Those long lines remind us of how critical it is to have that capacity. It is about jobs, those skilled craftsmen who work in the refineries day in and day out.…
