Jay Inslee: “I was in a town hall meeting the other day, and I had a constituent that sort of suggested that it would have been…”

“I was in a town hall meeting the other day, and I had a constituent that sort of suggested that it would have been simpler just to cut out the middleman of giving us any tax break at all when it goes right to the oil companies. He said it reminded him of a money laundering scheme. I do not think that is too far off the mark. Mr. Speaker, I have a message for the rest of the United States, and that is it is not just California. And it is coming to you in your neighborhood, because it is in Oregon and it is in Washington now. It may have started in California, but right now in the State of Washington, we are suffering potentially 43,000 people losing their jobs, Mr. Speaker, as a result of these oil companies and generating companies increasing their prices, not twice, not 5 times, not 10 times, but on the wholesale spot market for electricity right now in the State of Washington, these companies have increased their price 1,000 percent, 2,000 percent, without spending another dime to generate one single electron. These are windfall profits that people are enjoying right now at our expense. Forty-three thousand families out of work because these folks have a callous indifference to the economy of Washington, Oregon, California and, soon, whatever State you are in.”