The conservative group FreedomWorks on Wednesday withdrew its support for a Republican-backed bill to lift the 40-year-old ban on oil exports after discovering new spending was added to the measure.
The group’s decision comes as other conservative groups also are coming out against the bill, threatening to scuttle support for the measure. The groups oppose the inclusion of $500 million of taxpayer funds to support a “back-room” deal to increase spending for a little-known defense program to gain votes.
“We have always supported repealing the ban on exporting U.S. oil,” said the group’s legislative affairs director, Josh Withrow. “However, we are withdrawing our support of the bill due to the closed-door, crony-capitalist process that the House is engaging in.”
Withrow told the Washington Examiner Tuesday about his group’s plans to formally withdraw its support for the rule after it was found out a $500 million gift to the maritime unions was inserted into the bill.
“Without this provision, the bill would have had our full support,” Withrow said Wednesday.
The group Heritage Action issued a statement Tuesday evening saying the measure tacked onto the bill quietly last week by the House Rules Committee would increase payments for a little-known program that supports a 60-ship fleet of private vessels to provide logistical support for the Department of Defense.
“The policy changes made in H.R. 702 [lifting the ban] are commendable, but a last-minute addition to the bill has entangled good policy in corporate welfare and a $500 million labor union buyoff,” Heritage said, opposing the measure.
The measure would give $500 million to a program called the Maritime Security Program. The program was started in the 1990s “and currently provides contract payments of $3.1 million a year to vessels participating in the program” for 10 years, Heritage said.
The addition would raise the program’s spending level by more than 60 percent. And nearly half of that “new funding will go to two U.S.-based subsidiaries of the Dutch shipping company, Maersk Line,” according to the group.
The conservative groups see it as an attempt to use taxpayer money to “literally buy votes,” Heritage said. The change is being included to gain support from Democrats, who typically support maritime workers and their unions, to try to override an expected presidential veto.
The Rules Committee is meeting Wednesday afternoon to discuss the bill ahead of a scheduled vote Friday. Lobbyists expect the White House to issue a veto threat after the meeting.
