Chuck Schumer: “I rise to discuss rising energy prices. I remind President Bush, as he leaves for his trip to the Middle East, his ally…”

“I rise to discuss rising energy prices. I remind President Bush, as he leaves for his trip to the Middle East, his ally, Saudi Arabia, holds the key to reducing gasoline prices at home in the short term. I, along with my colleagues, Senator Dorgan of North Dakota, Senator Casey of Pennsylvania, Senator Klobuchar of Minnesota, and Senator Sanders of Vermont plan to submit a Senate resolution that would block all four pending arms deals to Saudi Arabia, which together total $1.4 billion, unless Saudi Arabia shows that our friendship is a two-way street and increases its oil production by 1 million barrels per day above the January 2008 output levels. Because these weapons have not yet been delivered to Saudi Arabia, Congress still has the power to block these four deals as leverage to get the world's larger oil producer to bring its production back to historical levels, an action that would have the single greatest impact of lowering gas prices in the short term. If Saudi Arabia would increase production by 1 million barrels a day, the price of gasoline would go down 50 cents a gallon almost immediately.”