GOP Pushes Back Against Dem Energy Deal
Following an agreement last night with Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson (D-Minn.), House Democrats are poised this week to pass an energy and climate change bill that has stewed in uncertainty since being passed out of committee one month ago.
The bill will now hit the House floor on Friday, with a vote likely to take place by Saturday. The House is in recess next week.
The sudden accord followed weeks of debate within the Democratic Caucus and set off an equally quick response from Republicans, whose leadership continues to oppose the plan offered by Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.).
“House Republicans are opposed to the national energy tax that is reportedly making its way to the House floor this week,” House Minority Leader John Boehner (Ohio) said at a Tuesday afternoon press conference on health care. “This is a very bad idea.”
Republicans are focusing their argument on the bill’s cost — in taxes and jobs — especially in coal-producing and agriculture-rich areas. GOP leaders argue it would cost the average household an extra $3,000 per year in energy costs and cite a study released last month by the National Black Chamber of Commerce that predicted the bill would cost 2.5 million jobs.
“Not only will this drive up prices for food, gasoline, and electricity, it will ship millions of jobs to competitors like China and India that refuse to take the same approach,” Boehner wrote Tuesday in an op-ed in the Washington Examiner…
The National Republican Congressional Committee shot off press releases yesterday into the districts of Iowa Democrats Bruce Braley and Dave Loebsack — both second-term lawmakers in formerly Republican districts.
“With fellow Iowa Democrat Leonard Boswell’s office stating that the National Energy Tax will hurt Iowa families, it’s time for Bruce Braley to come clean and tell his Iowa constituents where he stands on the controversial bill. Does he side with Iowa families or with his liberal leader, Nancy Pelosi?” asked NRCC communications director Ken Spain in one of the releases.
A second NRCC press release went out to 20 other Democrats that represent rural areas. “As Rep. Bobby Bright (D-AL) prepares to vote on the climate change bill in Congress this week, Speaker Pelosi is plotting to snag Bright’s vote for her costly, job-killing climate bill at the expense of middle-class agriculture jobs in Alabama,” one release states.
House Minority Leader Eric Cantor (Va.) and other Republicans from coal-producing states have scheduled a press conference for Wednesday morning. The sub-headline of the press release announcing the event reads, “National Energy Tax is Wrong for Coal Country and Will Cost Americans Jobs.”…
As word leaked last night that a deal had been reached, Republicans continued to push back on any compromises made to pacify Democrats who had reservations about the bill’s economic consequences.
“The backroom deal struck tonight by Chairman Peterson will not protect rural America from Speaker Pelosi’s national energy tax,” Boehner spokesman Michael Steel said in a statement. “Though he eked out a few trivial concessions, the core of this legislation remains the same: a job-killing tax increase that will hit every single American, especially middle class families in the heartland of America.”
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