The latest dead-on-arrival lame-duck proposal from the White House came Thursday. In a statement about its “21st Century Clean Transportation System” plan, the Obama administration said it would pay for new infrastructure spending with a “new fee paid by oil companies.” Here’s an excerpt:
The chairman of the White House’s Council of Economic Advisers, Jason Furman, defended the $10 fee—or, more accurately, tax—on CNBC Friday morning. “Some of it would be certainly passed along to consumers, the consumers that would benefit from the infrastructure investments that we’re talking about making here,” said Furman.
Host Carl Quintanilla was skeptical the tax would ever be implemented. “There’s no real chance this is going to see the light of day, is there?” he said.
“In general, the president’s approach is laying out his vision of where the country should go, talking about what he thinks needs to be done to strengthen our economy,” Furman responded. “And we’ll be discussing with Congress, pushing the idea forward, but certainly I wouldn’t be taking any single proposal and ask, Is it going to pass this year? I’d ask, Is it a good idea, can we push the idea forward?”
Beyond the spin, there’s a lot of truth behind Furman’s assessment of the proposal. If there were any idea a Republican Congress would even seriously consider Obama’s oil tax, that was dispelled by Thursday evening.
“Good grief. The president’s proposed new tax will hurt those most vulnerable. Jump starting the economy by raising taxes is not a solution that will fly in the Republican Congress,” said Fred Upton, the chairman of the House Energy and Commerce committee in a statement. Upton’s counterpart in the Senate, Lisa Murkowksi, responded similarly. “This is disappointing, but not surprising. Especially at a time of low prices, the President should be looking at ways to make our energy sector more competitive, not pushing new policies that will cost jobs and raise prices. Fortunately, with Republicans in charge of Congress, Alaskans need not worry about this becoming law,” she said in a statement.
House speaker Paul Ryan also denounced the plan in a statement. “Once again, the president expects hardworking consumers to pay for his out of touch climate agenda,” said Ryan. “A $10 tax for every barrel of oil produced would raise energy prices—hurting poor Americans the most.”
That’s Congress, but according to Furman the proposal is part of Obama’s “vision” for the country—one we can reasonably assume would be part of the Democratic party’s vision in this year’s elections.
Some of the potential Republican nominees have already responded to the tax proposal. Jeb Bush said he is “opposed” to it. “This energy tax will raise costs for working families to pay for more failed Solyndra-style federal government giveaways,” said the former Florida governor. “I’ve put forth a detailed energy plan that will lower prices, create jobs, and make America energy secure.”
His fellow Floridian and rival Marco Rubio brought up the proposal at his town-hall event in New Hampshire Thursday. “You may not have heard this, it just broke on the news. The president wants to solve transportation issues in America. Being from the left, guess what his answer—what do you think the answer was to our transportation issues? A tax! It’s his answer to everything,” Rubio said. “Everything is a tax. Now it is going to be a ten dollar a barrel tax. Who’s going to pay that? You are. You are going to pay it.”
“Sure, the barrel of oil is down to 35 dollars,” Rubio continued. “It’s not going to be down there forever. But the tax will be. All to fund this pipe dream that he has with his high-speed this, and clean cars that. We don’t need a tax for these things. Everything is about a tax. They are obsessed with taxes.”
