Kay Bailey Hutchison: “I want to say I do support the nomination of Secretary Pena. However, I think it is very important that this new…”

“I want to say I do support the nomination of Secretary Pena. However, I think it is very important that this new Secretary take the opportunity to set an energy policy in this country that says to the American people that energy self-sufficiency is our goal. We should be able to create energy through our own natural resources, not only to create jobs in America, but also to make sure that our country is strong with energy self-sufficiency. I am going to work with Senator John Breaux, my cochair of the Oil and Gas Caucus, to try to make sure that we take the duplication of regulation off of our oil and gas industry. Where State regulators are able to handle the issues, we should let it happen at the State level rather than the Federal Government duplicating the regulations which become costly and burdensome to our oil and gas industry. Why not put that money into new capital creations, to create new jobs in our country, rather than going through more bureaucratic morass that so hampers our businesses? I also want to give incentives, incentives to drill and explore for our own natural resources, especially marginal drilling that is more expensive. Why not give incentives so we can create the jobs in America and also create energy resources for our country that would make us more able to be sufficient?”