[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 90 (Wednesday, June 16, 2010)]
[House]
[Pages H4584-H4590]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                  CONGRESS MUST ACT TO DEFEND THE GULF

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Bright). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 6, 2009, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Carter) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Mr. CARTER. Mr. Speaker, I thank you for this hour. It's going to be 
an interesting couple of weeks on this issue of this oil spill, because 
we are going to get two conflicting points of view. I actually heard, I 
believe, that somehow this oil spill is now George W. Bush's fault. It 
reminds me of the game, the Kevin Bacon game that your job is no matter 
what actor or movie you lay out before the public, you have got to 
bring it back in seven cycles to Kevin Bacon. And it seems that 
everything that goes on in the United States, that the majority party 
seems to somehow think whatever goes on in the United States they can 
somehow track it back to George W. Bush.
  And what I heard was that Mr. Bush had used a drilling rig at some 
point in his life, and therefore it's Bush's fault that there was a 
failure, or something to that extent, a failure on this BP drilling 
rig. It's time to really stop. It's getting a little old for the 
American public, for them to hear constantly that no matter what goes 
wrong in the Obama administration it's George W. Bush's fault. I think 
this is getting a little old and getting a little bit, it seems to be 
sort of a fantasy that seems to be prevailing.
  We have got a great disaster in the gulf, and nobody's denying we 
have a great disaster in the gulf. Today I heard a man who actually 
knows something about drilling in the gulf. I haven't heard anyone 
stand up that has talked on the majority side tonight and said, By the 
way, I have drilled these, and let me tell you what has happened in the 
gulf.
  But Trent Franks came before us today and showed us what has happened 
in the gulf--it is very interesting--and why the cap failed that they 
first started, and why the wells that are being drilled to intersect 
this well, the relief wells should be successful. And, you know, if you 
want to know how you do something, you ought to talk to somebody that's 
actually done it. And Trent, a Member of this body, has actually done 
it.
  So we will find out, whenever we get this spill stopped, we will find 
out what happened in the gulf to cause this thing to blow out. And it 
may be human error. It may be the company's error. It may be shortcuts 
they took. It may be the inspector's error. It could be just about 
anybody's error. We don't know.

  Now, the truth is we don't have to know yet because the presumption 
is overwhelming that it's BP's responsibility, and they admit it. It's 
their responsibility. But blame-gaming is not going to stop the oil 
from flowing into the gulf. Putting our resources together at every 
level from every source is part of what you do when you have a national 
emergency. I don't care whether that national emergency has the name 
Katrina or Rita or Ike or any of the other names, or Carla or any of 
the other names of hurricanes that have swept across our gulf and 
attacked all Gulf States at some point in time, or it has the name--
what's the name of this well? I can't even remember anymore. Anyway, 
just call it the BP well in the Gulf of Mexico that blew out. Blame 
game's not solving the problem.
  What's the problem? When it's the hurricane, the wind's blowing and 
things are getting torn down, and we need to put our resources together 
to help the people and the industries that are attacked by that 
hurricane. Today we have animals, we have sea life, we have wildlife, 
sea life, human life that is threatened by this BP oil spill.

[[Page H4585]]

  And our first job, and the job not only of British Petroleum but of 
those of us who have the responsibility of protecting this country, 
which would be the President of the United States, the executive 
department, this Congress, and everybody involved, should have 
immediately poured massive, massive support into doing something about 
this oil well and stopping this spill. And we should have done it 
through the people who have the intelligence and the technology to tell 
us just exactly what we are dealing with.
  I wouldn't recommend you call a great white hunter in Africa to tell 
him how to put down this oil spill. I wouldn't recommend that you call 
a surgeon in Brooklyn, New York, and ask him to put down this oil 
spill. And I wouldn't recommend you talk to a community organizer and 
ask him how to put down this oil spill. I would recommend that you 
immediately, when this happened, approach those people who have the 
expertise to deal with this oil spill and do it. And quite honestly, I 
think we have to say that the President of the United States told us 
the buck stops with him, so he's the person who should have started 
this ball rolling when this whole thing started coming down on us.
  I have got a little chart up here, the gulf spill timeline. And we 
are going to look at that for just a minute to see how well we did in 
deciding that we were, as a government, going to join the oil and gas 
industry in coming up with a solution to British Petroleum's disaster 
that they had created in our blessed Gulf of Mexico. In fact, I think I 
have the State with the largest amount of Gulf of Mexico coastline of 
any State in this Union. And it would be close, Florida would be a 
close second. And they may have more. I don't know. But certainly the 
State of Texas has a lot. So let's look at this thing for just a 
second.
  April 20, 2010, and today is June 16. So looking back to April 20, 
the explosion occurred. Eleven people were killed. Right there we knew 
we had a problem. The first oil leak was officially recognized and 
revealed by the administration in Washington on April 24. So 4 days 
later, the administration acknowledged and revealed to us that there 
was an oil leak.
  On April 28, the Secretary of the Interior, Mr. Salazar, traveled 
down to the BP command center in Houston. April 29, the Homeland 
Security Secretary Napolitano announced a spill of national 
significance, and President Obama made his first public remarks about 
the disaster. That's 9 days after it occurred. April 30, the President 
deployed his senior administration officials to the gulf region and 
makes a request for remarks about what's going on, and the Louisiana 
National Guard was activated to assist. That's a start. That's a first 
start.
  The President visits the gulf on May 2. It looks like 13 days after 
the event. Cabinet officers briefed the Members of Congress on May 4 
about the seriousness of this event.

                              {time}  1900

  May 11, Louisiana requests emergency permission from the Federal 
Government to dredge barriers to construct berms. Now, when I was about 
18 years old, I worked in south Louisiana, and the whole ecology and 
economy of Louisiana is directly affected by what they call the 
marshlands. There are literally thousands of people who make their 
living because the marshlands in Louisiana thrive to be breeding 
grounds and producing grounds for numerous amounts of seafood products. 
And in fact, I would venture to say that there's not anybody who eats 
seafood in the United States, and have done so for any length of time 
at all in their life, has eaten seafood that was produced as a result 
of the overall environment of the Louisiana coastal region, which is 99 
percent marsh.
  Now, marsh is different from the beach. The beach is bad. If you've 
got a beautiful beach like they had at Pensacola, that gorgeous white 
sand, or anywhere in Alabama or Mississippi or anywhere in Florida, tar 
balls on the beach and this nasty sludge coming into the beach is going 
to be icky and yucky and nasty. And if you get it all over your feet, 
you have to clean it off with alcohol, and it can burn you and tear you 
up.
  But if that stuff comes into the marsh, it can kill and will kill 
plant life, animal life, and ocean life.
  So when the Governor of Louisiana, who was so unfairly criticized 
here tonight by the opposition, when the Governor said, look, guys, at 
least authorize some dredging to put some sand barriers between us, 
between our marsh and that terrible spill that's headed our direction, 
and yet it wasn't until the 27th of May that the Federal Government 
granted Louisiana a partial permission to dredge sand up to build sort 
of an island-like barrier so maybe that oil will hit the sand and not 
come in where all the plants and the wildlife and the sea life lives 
and thrives and functions.
  But that was only 27 days too late, and the 28th of May, the 
President went down on a second visit to the Gulf States, and this is 
what he told us: The buck stops with me.
  I agree with him. The buck stops with the President of the United 
States, and now we are hearing people scream about a national disaster, 
which it is, and the President of the United States' job was to lead, 
and lead means go out and if you have to, roll up your sleeves and suck 
oil out of the water. You certainly need to get people out there that 
are taking it seriously enough to follow the instructions of the man on 
the ground, Governor Jindal, who said it's not a solution, but it sure 
would help if there's a barrier between us and that oil. And he 
shouldn't have had to wait for the Federal Government to hem and haw 
and say, well, we don't know what that sand island you're going to 
build is going to do to the overall environment of south Louisiana. 
What does it matter? The oil is going to come in there and wreck it. So 
let's just dig up the sand. No, we had to wait.
  On the 29th of May, British Petroleum did its top-kill plan to try to 
stop the oil, and it failed. The 2nd of June, the Obama administration 
finally approved Louisiana's plan to dredge and tells BP to pay $360 
million for five new berms. The Justice Department announced a criminal 
investigation into the explosion and the spill. Let's see, that's all 
of May and 11 days in April when nothing of significance took place.
  June 14, the Senate Democrats write BP calling on the company to set 
up a $20 billion independent administrative escrow fund to compensate 
victims of the spill.
  June 15, that was yesterday, President Obama makes the Oval Office 
speech on the oil spill and uses the crisis to push climate change 
legislation.
  And if you heard what our colleagues were talking about in the 
previous 1 hour before this Congress, they were talking about that we 
need to have these alternative fuels to replace oil and replace 
petroleum products, in fact, all carbon products, coal, oil, natural 
gas. They talked to you about subsidies and other things, but they show 
you on their chart, and you see this one right here, it is algae, and 
next year we're going to replace all the energy produced by oil with 
algae if you will put the resources in algae. No, because it won't.
  If you say, look at these wind farms, this is going to replace all 
the energy we needed to charge our electric cars so we don't even have 
to run on any kind of petroleum product. And that's all we need is to 
subsidize that and pour money into it, and it will replace it in the 
next 2 years. So why am I using the term the next 2 years? Because the 
President of the United States has put a moratorium on drilling in the 
gulf, and 17 percent of our consumption on oil and oil products, which 
includes plastic and other byproducts of oil and natural gas, 17 
percent of that a year comes from deepwater drilling in the Gulf of 
Mexico. So, in 2 years, that's 34 percent of our fuel consumption 
nationwide that's going to have to be accounted for by somebody in some 
alternative form if we're going to give up on oil and gas.
  Are any of the alternatives that are even close to replacing 34 
percent of our energy consumption in this country? No. Will there be? 
Maybe. But the reality is, we get up in the morning, and we start our 
cars, and we drive to work. And generally we're burning gasoline or 
diesel, all of which are products of the petroleum industry. And if 
you're not going to use gas or diesel, then you better hook a sail up 
to your car and hope the wind is blowing towards work or you're not 
going to work.

[[Page H4586]]

  So the reality is, to just cave in on an industry because of a 
terrible disaster is like saying, oh, my God, a 747 went down with 600 
passengers, shut down the air industry for the next 6 months. But 
here's the reality: The reality is this 6-month shutdown of the Gulf is 
actually going to be a 5-year shutdown of the Gulf because once they 
pull those rigs out of the Gulf, we're not going to get them back it's 
estimated for 3 to 5 years. So the 6-month moratorium in effect shuts 
down 17 percent of our energy production in this country for 5 years, 
potentially for 5 years.
  It is time to be realistic and say, what's the big problem right now? 
And it's the oil spill. Why is it a problem? Because oil is floating 
around on our pristine Gulf of Mexico. It is moving from State to 
State. It is eventually going to come ashore in someplace, and why 
aren't we doing everything we can to bring people over here from 
anywhere that will help and say we'll help?
  I'm going to add one more thing. On June 16, President Obama met with 
BP executives in the White House--that's today--and he got his $20 
billion to go into escrow. But the reality is where have we been, where 
has our leadership been of this country, the President of the United 
States and the administration, when this oil was spilling out of that 
well? Why didn't we answer the phone when the Dutch said 3 days after 
the spill started, we've got a fleet of skimmers that will come over to 
help you skim oil? Why didn't we respond? In fact, why didn't we say, 
world, we help you every chance you ask us to help you, give us a hand; 
anybody who's got resources that can soak up oil, please bring them to 
the United States and help us out?
  That kind of leadership had to come from the President of the United 
States, and the waiving of the antique act called the Jones Act had to 
be done by the President of the United States.
  So as we talk about this disaster, let's start by saying what's our 
real problem? And our real problem is this leaking oil, and we've got 
to clean it up. Before anything else, we've got to clean it up, but 
instead, we act to attack the drilling industry and shut down 17 
percent of our energy resources a year at a minimum because it's very, 
very good and popular to attack the oil industry. But in reality, 
tomorrow morning, when you crank up your engine, say to yourself, what 
kind of fuel is driving me to work today and where does it come from?
  I am very pleased to see that I'm joined by two of my colleagues, and 
I'm going to call on Mr. Mica from Florida to talk about this very, 
very disastrous situation and a bill that he has that offers some 
solutions.
  Mr. MICA. Thank you so much. We affectionately refer to the gentleman 
from Texas as Judge Carter, but a distinguished Member of Congress, a 
part of the leadership of the Republican team, and thank you also for 
coming tonight before the Congress and the American people, House of 
Representatives, to review probably what is one of the worst ecological 
disasters, natural disasters our country has ever experienced, and 
actually to come here and to review some of the timeline of what has 
taken place. You've touched on a number of important issues.
  First of all, as someone who comes from the State of Florida--we're 
part of the Gulf Coast--I have to extend our deepest, heartfelt 
sympathies to those that lost lives, both on the rig, and now we heard 
today from some of our colleagues, in an extensive review that we 
participated in on our side of the aisle, from some of those from the 
adjoining States, how their economy is suffering and how the proposed 
moratorium that's being arbitrarily imposed may make this disaster even 
worse. It's hard to imagine it being worse, but again, we empathize 
with those who have lost lives, who have been injured, and now have 
seen their livelihood dramatically impaired by this natural disaster.
  What we've got to do, though, is we've got to step back. We've got to 
look at what took place, and then we've got to look at some remedial 
action. Judge Carter, gentleman from Texas, raised some excellent 
points. This is now 60 days, almost two full months, into this disaster 
that took place on April 20. We have not had the proper response. 
That's evident.
  The gentleman talked about the need to bring skimmers and other craft 
in. He spoke about waiving the Jones Act, which President Bush did I 
think in 4 days afterwards. We haven't really called for a waiving of 
the Jones Act, but we would support it. It probably should have been 
done. There have been offers of foreign vessels.
  I was absolutely dumbfounded; on Saturday, I received an urgent e-
mail from those who are involved with American-flagged vessels, one of 
the leading maritime ship owners, domestically flagged, U.S. flag, who 
contacted me on Saturday. The message just floored me. Mr. Mica, our 
industry, American flag industry, doesn't mind waiving the Jones Act. 
The Jones Act does protect American jobs and American labor. Again it's 
great to have those flagged vessels. Waiving it is done on rare 
occasions and in emergencies, as President Bush did.

                              {time}  1915

  I was informed that we have flagged Jones Act-compliant vessels, 
American flag vessels waiting--this particular company, one of the 
largest maritime companies in the United States, American flag, has 
been waiting for a call. They've been waiting for a call from the 
Department of Homeland Security, from the Coast Guard, any Federal 
agency, or BP, to come in and provide--they have vessels that can help 
and could be helping in the cleanup even before we exempted vessels, 
foreign vessels to come in on this, and we've had an offer of that for 
some time. So I was shocked.
  I sent to Secretary Napolitano yesterday a letter and I outlined the 
information I got. I lead the Transportation Committee in the House on 
the Republican side, but I said, Madam Secretary, this is unbelievable 
that no one has even availed themselves of the American flag vessels 
who are ready, who have equipment. We should not be endangered in 
Florida or in other States in having that oil up on our shores. We have 
the capability that has not even been utilized to date. So this was my 
letter, my plea to the Secretary, and I'm shocked and disappointed.
  The other thing, too, is there seems to be a conflict. Last night, we 
heard the President say that we have been in charge, he's in charge as 
the Commander in Chief. Under the Oil Spill Recovery Act that we passed 
in 1990 after Exxon Valdez, it's pretty clear the chain of command, but 
Thad Allen, who is in charge of this, former Coast Guard commandant now 
in charge of the spill cleanup, he said, but we do not have the 
capability, the United States Government does not have the capability--
he said that over and over again, that the private sector has this 
capability. Here again we have U.S. flag vessels that can do the 
cleanup haven't gotten a call, still waiting. The Jones Act they could 
have waived and allowed those who volunteered assistance with skimmers 
and other equipment, that has not come in.
  So while there are folks in this administration who say they're in 
charge, there is some disconnect here in getting the equipment, getting 
the resources out there. In fact, the private sector has been in 
charge, and this is the first time the President has met with these 
folks. I was dumbfounded, too, today--and I think Judge Carter was in 
that meeting and other Members on our side of the aisle--when we heard 
the gulf coast delegation say they have requested but not yet met with 
the President of the United States. It's hard to believe the President 
would not meet with the elected Representatives of the gulf coast 
States to sit down.
  And then time and again we heard in the review that took place today 
of requests, simple requests for berms to stop the oil coming into the 
marshes, simple requests to act now, sooner rather than later. And 
we've seen the results of now that oil is making its way towards the 
Florida shores and doing even more damage. So if in fact the President 
is in charge, we need to free these vessels, employ every means 
possible to keep this disaster from going further.
  One other thing I disagree with the President on. I know it's 
important to act, and he did act in imposing a moratorium, but I think 
what they've got to do--and I believe he revised that moratorium to not 
affect the 3,500 shallow water drilling sites, but it is closing

[[Page H4587]]

down the deepwater drilling sites. Some of those are exploration sites. 
In fact, they probably should be closed until we have assurances that 
future deepwater drilling can be done. My point here is that by closing 
all of them down with a blanket moratorium, we are putting more people 
out of work, taking a horrible situation and making it worse. We will 
have even more people unemployed.
  So I think the logical, reasonable approach would be to send 
inspectors in, hire, retain whatever we need, or if they have 
government officials to go in and see that the deepwater drilling that 
is taking place where they actually have the well in production--which 
I think is about half of the approximately 30 deepwater wells that are 
out there. We don't want to make the situation worse economically for 
those that have lost their job, seeing their business close down or, 
again, see thousands of people put out of work by the wrong approach.
  So a reasonable approach. First, we get every piece of equipment, 
whether it's U.S. or foreign flag, there. This can be cleaned up. This 
is a doable job with U.S. vessels that have been waiting to hear that 
call from the administration. And then secondly, let's also be 
reasonable in the moratorium. I have been a strong advocate of keeping 
the U.S. independent and free as much as we could, drill where it's 
safe. My State of Florida I helped on a 100-mile setoff years and years 
ago. I thought that was reasonable. But you know, it may or may not 
make a difference because this was only 45 miles off the coast of 
Louisiana, as we see.
  The other thing we need to do is have a good backup system. We 
shouldn't be rubber-stamping approvals of any company, whether it's BP 
or anyone else. BP, in February of 2009, gave this--and this is a copy 
of it--this is the plan for their exploring that site and their doing 
an exploration well, a development well. This plan was submitted in 
March of 2009, over a year ago, and this is the one-page approval. I 
got a copy of this before our Transportation Committee hearing just 
before it took place. This is the one-page, carte blanche approval. I 
don't think some of the people in the Minerals Management Service even 
read this 59-page request. And we've heard hearings lately as to the 
failures of BP to outline a good, solid proposal.
  This proposal is the basic plan for drilling that BP submitted. It 
also refers to a much bigger document, and that's the actual 500-plus-
page document that details all of the spill cleanup procedures that BP 
would employ. That was also rubber-stamped with this approval, this 
one-page approval. So this was done by the Obama administration with 
people sleeping at the switch or not paying attention.
  What's shocking, and I heard former-Governor Palin telling the 
country this--and people should listen to Governor Palin on this--Sarah 
Palin, when she was the Governor, she was tough on the oil companies. 
No one passed anything by her. She cracked down on them, made sure they 
towed the line. And what was interesting is Governor Palin told what 
they did is, she said this never would have happened, this kind of 
approval, in her State because there would have been more scrutiny.
  The plan that BP offered, in addition to this 59 pages of the 500 
cleanup plan, it looks like BP merely mirrored the Alaska plan; in 
fact, it told how they were going to deal with cleaning up walruses, 
seals and polar bears, none of which I've seen in the Gulf of Mexico. 
So, again, the Minerals Management Service was asleep at the switch.
  What's finally startling is two things: one, I had our Transportation 
Infrastructure Committee get a copy of the President's budget. This is 
the Obama budget--not doctored or anything. I have the exact pages and 
cover copy of the budget. And in February of this year, before this oil 
spill, the President submitted a budget to our T&I Committee, 
Transportation and Infrastructure, that oversees the Coast Guard to 
slash the Coast Guard, our first responders, by 1,100 positions. In 
addition, he wanted to decommission and take out of service ships, 
helicopters, aircraft, all which are necessary for our first 
responders.
  I remember when Frank LoBiondo, who is my ranking member on the Coast 
Guard Committee within our Transportation Committee, when we heard 
about this, we sent out this press release--this was in February, after 
the President had recommended cutting our first responders. We said--
well, we said it's outrageous, but we said this is a recipe for 
disaster. This is dated February 25, after we got this. Then startling 
in this also, if you look a little bit further in the budget--not under 
our purview, but our staff found this--that the Minerals Management 
Service that the President talked about last night and how we need to 
clean that up and everything, in his budget that he proposed to 
Congress, he proposed slashing the Environmental Review Agency within 
that, or activities within that, agency by $2 million; pretty dramatic 
cut for someone who has to review, again, what the private sector 
submits, their plan, slashing that plan. I thought this was just 
unbelievable.
  And finally--this is in February. In March, the President came out--
and this is the story in The New York Times--and said that we have to 
increase drilling in the gulf. This is it. I didn't make it up. It's 
The New York Times: ``Obama to open offshore areas to oil drilling''--
and it says right here, the gulf. So first he's slashing first 
responders, then he's next proposing slashing the agency that does the 
environmental reviews. The review, again, the oil companies present 
that to the Minerals Management Service, they review it--I showed you 
the rubber stamp, April 6, that they approved it.
  And then finally, again, the main thing now is cleaning this mess up. 
And we've got to employ everyone we can, every piece of equipment, be 
it domestic or foreign, keep that from coming in.
  This is a doable job. When Governors ask to take steps, the solution 
doesn't need to be caught up for weeks in approvals from agencies. It 
shouldn't be why we can't do something. It should be, how can we get 
this accomplished? We've got people around the coast whose livelihood 
now depends on this. We can't let this disaster that's already done 
great damage to our economy--we have incredible loss of life that we've 
seen, and, again, we empathize with those who have lost loved ones in 
this tragedy, but we can't make a horrible tragedy even worse. So 
reasonableness on this approach.
  I thank Judge Carter, my colleague, the gentleman from Texas. I see 
we also have another outstanding member of our Transportation and 
Infrastructure Committee, Mr. Olson, also a gentleman from Texas. I 
thank you for coming out tonight, sharing with the Congress, the House 
of Representatives and our colleagues, some of the facts and 
information that need to get out to the public so that we can get this 
mess behind us. Thank you so much, and I yield back.

                              {time}  1930

  Mr. CARTER. Before you yield back, would you tell us a little bit 
about your Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund Improvement Act that you have 
proposed.
  Mr. MICA. Well, I will tell you right now that we are open to 
suggestions. We are looking at trying to be reasonable in whatever we 
do. To just impose unlimited caps on liability could be a very serious 
and damaging measure.
  First of all, let me say I believe that BP must be held accountable, 
fully accountable. Certainly, that company has the resources. They must 
be responsible for the cleanup. Even though there is a limit under the 
current 1990 statute of $75 million, they must be held accountable, far 
beyond that, for economic damages.
  What we don't want to see is that we make the terms for liability so 
high that only a few multinational corporations will ever be in the oil 
business. Small producers in Texas and throughout the gulf--there are 
thousands of people in business--do a good job day in and day out. 
3,500 of 3,600, I believe, active rigs in the gulf are in shallow 
water, but they shouldn't be penalized by the failure of government or 
by the failure of a big corporation. Let's hold their feet to the fire.
  So we are going to work with the Democrats. We are going to work with 
the administration. We are going to try to craft something that is fair 
and reasonable, that holds people accountable and that holds their feet 
to the fire.
  The current fund that we have shouldn't be just a slush fund or front 
financing of the cleanup for BP or for any big company. That was 
actually set up for orphan spills or for a company that may not have 
the assets but

[[Page H4588]]

that was responsible for a spill. We want that fund to continue to 
work, and we may need to put more funds in it to make certain that we 
have coverage for the future. Again, what we don't want to do is put in 
place insurance and liability limits that are so high that very few 
people can meet those requirements.
  So we are crafting that legislation. We want to do it in a bipartisan 
manner. The law does need to be altered. We should learn, and we should 
benefit by this horrible experience, and we should make it better and 
make certain that it doesn't happen again.
  Again, thank you for your leadership and for asking me to participate 
tonight.
  Mr. CARTER. I thank the gentleman for what he has had to say.
  I want to tell you that my wife is Dutch, so I took a little offense 
at the fact that we had an offer of help of a fleet of skimmers from 
the Dutch. It is my understanding we gave no response. Maybe that's 
different. I don't know. All I know is that I'm like Will Rogers. All I 
know is what I read in the newspapers. Now I'm even more upset since 
I've found out we have American-flagged ships waiting in the harbor 
ready to help, and nobody has asked for their help. The leadership that 
runs this country, the executive branch of the government, ought to be 
ashamed of themselves.
  Mr. MICA. Will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. CARTER. I yield back.
  Mr. MICA. In conclusion, I do want to say that I work very closely 
with Mr. Oberstar, the Democrat chair of the T&I Committee. When we 
found out that the $1.6 billion fund has a $150 million cap for 
emergency use, we came together last week. I offered legislation 
specifically to deal with that. Again, we have to act in a responsible 
manner for the country. We passed that. The House concurred with us. We 
have provided some temporary relief.
  Again, I'm not going to let the $1.6 billion or the $150 million be a 
piggy bank for BP or for any responsible parties, but we want to make 
certain that all of the resources are there on an emergency basis to 
the administration, to the Coast Guard, to whomever, so no one can say 
that Congress didn't act in a timely fashion. We were alerted that some 
of the funds were running low in that emergency portion of the $1.6 
billion, which is put out in advance.
  So I talked a little bit before about the legislation we are looking 
at on liability caps, and that is what we have done in a bipartisan 
fashion today. We did that, and we are prepared to do even more on the 
caps, whatever it takes and whatever resources and assets of the 
government and of the private sector we can bring to bear to bring this 
horrible disaster under control.
  Thank you again for your leadership, both of our Texas Members--Mr. 
Carter and Mr. Olson.
  Mr. CARTER. In reclaiming my time, let me say right off that I am 
very, very proud to be part of a Congress that instantly reacts to a 
crisis situation. Mr. Oberstar should be commended for that reaction. 
That is what we are asking for the entire government to do. Let's react 
positively. Let's work as a team. Let's quit blaming previous 
administrations. Let's do the job to clean this mess up.
  I thank you very much.
  My good friend from Texas lives in the heart of All Country USA. 
Houston, Texas, is, to my way of thinking, the center of the universe 
for the oil industry, and my good friend Pete Olson is one of the 
members of our Houston delegation who is very knowledgeable in this 
area. He has some legislation, and there may be other things that he 
wishes to talk about, so I yield to my friend Pete Olson, the Member 
from Sugar Land and all points south, to talk to us about how he feels 
about what is going on today.
  Mr. OLSON. Well, thank you for hosting this Special Order tonight on 
such a critically important issue for the American people.
  I would like to thank my colleague from Florida for coming by and for 
giving his perspectives on how this disaster is affecting Florida.
  I'm going to have a theme tonight, Judge. I was in the Navy for 10 
years--a naval officer. We're trained to lead. I mean, in my aircraft, 
I was a crew of 12--five officers, seven enlisted folks. I was the 
patrol plane commander, so those 11 individuals depended upon me to 
take them out, to do the mission, and to come back home safely. To sum 
it up in two words, the philosophy is ``leaders lead.'' Well, guess 
what? We are not seeing leadership out of Washington.
  We've had a very difficult situation. We've had the largest oil spill 
in American history, and there are thousands of jobs affected by it 
already: the food processing industry; the fishing industry across the 
coasts of Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama; the tourist industry. 
We're hitting the summer season. This is when people go on vacations. 
We're past Memorial Day. From what I hear, the hotels are about half 
full. It has had a significant impact on the people of the gulf coast.
  Yet what does the administration do? Do they lead? No. Again, in a 
knee-jerk reaction to this terrible tragedy, they imposed a 6-month 
moratorium on deepwater drilling--all of it stopped. Again, it's a 
disaster for our economy and for our Nation. Let me go over some of the 
specifics with you as I know my good friend knows.
  There are 150,000 jobs that are going to be lost because of this 
moratorium. That's 1\1/2\ times my hometown of Sugar Land, which the 
judge mentioned. That's like wiping out Sugar Land and going down to 
Rosenberg or Richmond and taking them off the map. This is 150,000 
jobs.
  There are 33 rigs currently out there. I've talked to a constituent 
in my district who has an ownership interest in two of those rigs.

  I asked him last week, How long can you hang out?
  He said, Three weeks max.
  How much is it costing you?
  Well, the rigs are a little different. One's down around $500,000 a 
day. The other one is at $1 million a day. $1 million.
  If this baby goes on, if this moratorium goes on for 6 months, that 
is going to be $180 million that that company is going to just have to 
absorb. Yet you know what they're going to do. Guess what? They're 
going. They're going overseas. He has been talked to. My constituent 
has been talked to, and he has had interest from Australia, from 
Brazil, from western Africa, and from eastern Africa already. He is 
considering their options very seriously because he can't afford to be 
paying $500,000 or $1 million per day as long as this moratorium goes 
on. This is going to have a devastating effect on our domestic 
production of energy.
  One of the great problems we have in America--and it is something we 
should have fixed years ago--is our dependence on foreign oil. We all 
remember 1979 when the Shah fell, when Iran was taken over by the 
Ayatollah Khomeini and when the Arab world cut off our fuel supply. I 
was a 16-year-old in Houston, Texas, and I had just gotten my driver's 
license. So my job was to take the car up when it got down to about a 
quarter of a tank of gas. I'd take it up and get in that gas line 
depending on what the last number of my license plate was--odd or even 
on an odd or even day--and I loved it. I was standing there with my 
radio and with my window rolled down. Now that I'm an adult, I realize 
what a disaster that was. It's not gone. I mean it's still out there 
today.
  As the judge knows, we've got serious challenges in the Middle East. 
I mean Mr. Ahmadinejad in Iran is scary. I mean he is trying to get a 
nuclear weapon. He was here in our country a couple of weeks ago at the 
United Nations. He sat down with George Stephanopoulos and literally--
this is the leader of Iran--told him that Osama bin Laden is here in 
Washington, D.C. Let me say that again. Judge, I think Osama bin Laden 
is here in Washington, D.C. This guy is trying to get some nuclear 
weapons. He certainly has some oil, and he has friends out there--the 
Saudis and others--who would cut him off if something happens.
  What has happened, as you know, too, Judge, just as well, is that 
this administration has hurt our relationship with our great ally 
Israel. In 18 months, our relationship with Israel has gone from being 
one of our strongest allies to someone the world looks at and asks, Is 
the United States really with them? That has created another dangerous 
situation where countries out there are going to start taking chances 
and taking shots at our best friend. Again, what happens at the end of 
the day if we stand up for Israel?

[[Page H4589]]

Maybe we get another oil embargo. We can't afford that. Yet this 
administration's actions by imposing this 6-month moratorium on 
deepwater drilling in the gulf are going to help that cause.
  I don't know where to start sometimes. As my colleagues have 
mentioned, we introduced a bill yesterday, a very simple bill. It's one 
page--half a page. It basically says, Let's end the moratorium, Mr. 
President. We had a meeting today with Mr. Salazar. The Secretary of 
the Interior came over today.
  I asked him, Do you believe that you were given all of the accurate 
analysis on the economic impact of this moratorium on deepwater 
drilling? Did you know all of the facts? Did you know that 150,000 
Americans are going to lose their jobs and that those rigs in the gulf 
are most likely going to go overseas and start developing oil in 
foreign nations? They're not coming back any time soon.
  It's a minimum--a minimum from what I've heard from the people in my 
district--of 5 years before those rigs will even consider coming back 
because they will have paid all that money to go over there. They're 
going to sit there. They're going to make money. They're going to 
decrease our national reserves here in America, and they're going to 
increase our dependence on foreign oil.
  Again, Judge, leaders lead. What has the administration done?
  Well, you know, as you talked about earlier, Governor Jindal asked 
for some sand, for about 24 miles of sand to place in between some of 
the marshlands that were going to be impacted by the oil spill. It took 
our government 3 weeks to approve that.
  Why? Why? he asked.
  Well, we had to do some studies. You know, the Environmental 
Protection Agency had to look and make sure that, if we put that sand 
in front of the berms, we weren't going to do some things to hurt the 
birds and the wildlife behind that.
  You're going to hurt the wildlife behind that, and you're going to 
damage those birds when that oil gets in there. Put the sand up. 
Prevent that from happening. Let's deal with that problem. Amazing.
  The Jones Act. You talked about that. We've got great allies out 
there who want to help us, who have come to us and who have said, 
Please, we can help you. What did we do? No thanks. We've got this law 
that requires American unions, our unions, to man the ships. We don't 
need your help.
  Katrina, 2005. President Bush was asked, you know, to waive the Jones 
Act. He stepped up and did it. Why? Because it was right for America. 
He was focused on the problem, which was help Louisiana and New Orleans 
recover from that hurricane.
  The problem here is real simple, Judge. We've got oil spewing out of 
a hole in the Gulf of Mexico. We need to focus on that. That's the 
problem, and the administration is not focused on that. Again, leaders 
lead.
  What do we see out of the White House today? Coerced British 
Petroleum to a $20 billion slush fund, a privately funded slush fund 
for government to use and spend as they see fit. Now, BP has made some 
mistakes, and the investigation is not complete, but there is a lot of 
evidence and indication that they have made some mistakes, have cut 
some corners and have done things that haven't been consistent with 
standard operating procedure.

                              {time}  1945

  And they should agree to reimburse the Americans who have been 
affected by that.
  But for the government to force upon them a $20 million concession 
that the government's going to handle and dole out as they see fit is 
just not what's in our country's interest. We see what this 
administration has done if we give them large amounts of money. The 
first big vote I had as a Member of Congress, almost $900 billion in 
economic stimulus package. Guess what? Has it stimulated the economy 
like the administration, like the President, said it would? Has it kept 
our job rate below 8 percent; our unemployment rate? No. We're hovering 
about 10 percent. What do we spend it on? You know the answer to that, 
Judge. Two-thirds of the money has been spent on public sector jobs and 
one-third on private sector jobs. I'd submit--and this isn't taking 
much of a chance--that's not how you grow an economy. And yet the 
administration has now coerced British Petroleum to give them $20 
billion as they see fit.
  Finally, and I've got the President's speech here, about the last 
third of it didn't have anything to do with the Gulf of Mexico. It had 
something to do with a much bigger agenda. He was talking about why 
this substantiated and justified the administration's pursuit of a 
hydrocarbon emission law--a cap-and-tax, as we call it up here in the 
House. I mean, again, why are we talking about this when we've got oil 
spilling out of the Gulf right now. And the answer is: because the 
administration has an agenda that doesn't have anything to do with the 
oil coming out. It has everything to do with changing America, making 
us uncompetitive in a global market, increasing our costs of energy for 
every American consumer, and getting a big tax increase with all these 
payments, allotments that the corporations, companies, small businesses 
across America have to pay. And it's quite frustrating.
  I mean, when I go back home, Judge, and I am sure you get this, 
What's going on in D.C.? And, Who's leading? An the answer is, Nobody 
is leading right now. Again, leaders lead. And that's why I introduced 
that law that you mentioned earlier to just repeal the moratorium. Get 
the American people back working on those wells.
  The President, as you recall, met this past week with the families, 
the families of the 11 rig workers that were killed in the explosion. 
Many of them, from the press reports, told him, Please, Mr. President, 
don't do this moratorium. Don't do this to my husband, who most of 
these people were born and raised in small towns in Louisiana, like 
Homer, and they planned on living their lives there, raising their 
children there, raising grandchildren there. And they see what's at 
stake here. They don't want a moratorium, even though their family 
members have made the ultimate sacrifice.
  It's my hope that the administration listens to the American people, 
looks at the numbers of 150,000 jobs that are going to be lost. Just 
the fact that we're going to lose all of our--most of our domestic 
offshore production of oil, and we're going to take that overseas to 
foreign nations. And one other thing is the second largest income tax 
source for the Federal Government is offshore drilling. About $6 
billion a year, bye-bye. It's just incredibly frustrating as a freshman 
Member of Congress that we're going through this, Judge. We need to 
fight to make sure that this moratorium is repealed, because it's in 
America's best interest.
  Mr. CARTER. Reclaiming my time for a moment, I asked Trent Frank, who 
is an experienced offshore driller, as we all know. I said, Trent, what 
kind of salaries do these guys make? He said, The ordinary laborer--
which in my day, at least, we used to call those guys roughnecks or 
roustabouts--$60 an hour. And the high-tech guys, the guys that can 
drive a drill bit down 5,000 feet under the water and another 
multithousands of feet and hit a 12-inch hole where this oil is coming 
out of, with that kind of skill, they're paid a lot more.
  Now the question I would have for the administration, if you take the 
drilling away and all those people are looking for a job to replace 
that income, where is the guy who developed his skills through 
experience at the low-paying job on a well? So maybe he's got a high 
school education, and he learned his job on the job. Where is he going 
to find $60 an hour to support his family on? It doesn't exist.
  Mr. OLSON. Will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. CARTER. I yield.
  Mr. OLSON. Judge, I think the President gave us the answer to your 
question there. In his speech yesterday, this is what he said. 
``Already, I have issued a 6-month moratorium on deepwater drilling. I 
know this creates difficulty for the people who work on these rigs, but 
for the sake of safety and for the sake of the entire region, we need 
to know the facts before we allow deepwater drilling to continue.''
  Mr. CARTER. Reclaiming my time, in wrapping this up, there's a lot of 
things that the Republicans--we get accused of an awful lot of things 
around here. We're going to ignore

[[Page H4590]]

those accusations. Mr. Blunt has a bill. The Oil Spill Response and 
Assistance Act, by Mr. Roy Blunt from Missouri, H.R. 5336, requires the 
Secretary of Energy to develop and deploy technology for the use in the 
event of breach or explosion at or at a significant discharge of oil 
from a deepwater port, offshore facility, or tank vessel, including 
caps, fireproof booms, remote-operated submersibles, 24-hour response 
time, double liability limits for oil companies.
  Mr. Blunt is addressing the issue. Mr. Schock has an Offshore Safety 
and Response. We have legislation. Let's do our job. And let's 
continue. Let's end that moratorium and continue to drill. And be safe.

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