Political Quotes

“Republicans in both Chambers have introduced a resolution to permit oil, gas, and mining companies to continue making secret payments--involving billions of dollars--to corrupt foreign governments in exchange for access to their countries' natural resources. This resolution would overturn legislation on which I worked closely with former Republican Senator Richard Lugar and Senator Cardin and was included as section 1504 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act to provide greater transparency when such payments are made and help better inform investors and combat massive corruption in the process. One would think that everyone here would support a commonsense rule that will protect investors and make it a lot harder to get away with the theft of billions of dollars in public funds in some of the poorest countries of the world. But apparently, that is not a concern, at least not to the sponsors of this resolution or those who intend to support its passage. Some Republicans and their friends in the oil and gas industry say this rule creates unacceptable burdens. That is utterly without merit, as I will explain in a moment. But even assuming there were a grain of truth to that, rather than proposing to amend the underlying legislation, which would require bipartisan support, this resolution is being advanced under the Congressional Review Act, to enable a simple majority vote to completely dismantle the rule with minimum debate.…”