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ANWR legislation dormant for now Resource Chairman Pombo seeks support for reviving offshore drilling language in shrinking U.S. House budget reconciliation bill Rose Ragsdale Petroleum News Contributing Writer
One week after removing provisions for oil and gas drilling on the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge coastal plain (1002 area) from a budget reconciliation bill, Republican leaders in the U.S. House of Representatives still struggled to find enough votes to pass the contentious legislation.
The $50 billion deficit-cutting budget bill was expected to reach the House floor as early as Nov. 18. But Republican leaders, who considered 11th-hour changes late Nov. 16, left open the possibility of the vote being postponed until Nov. 19. Possible changes include dropping proposed reductions in food stamp programs, Medicaid and child support enforcement. But aides said potential costs could bring the five-year savings well below $50 billion.
“We’re going to get spending reconciliation,” vowed Majority Leader Roy Blunt, R-Mo. He told reporters Nov. 16 that House GOP leaders were close to passing the bill and they were right on the brink last week before the clock ran out.
Rhetoric on the bill, meanwhile, escalated as Republican conservatives and moderates battled over its merits.
Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind., chairman of the conservative Republican Study Committee, told House members in a closed-door conference meeting Nov. 16 that anyone voting against reconciliation had turned his or her back on the so-called Reagan Revolution, a GOP aide in attendance told Capitol Hill reporters.
Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass., said Republicans were beginning to show the outward strain that has resulted from an internal GOP debate over energy policy.
“The drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and the Outer Continental Shelf is the major oil and gas industry dream that the Republicans have yet to deliver,” Markey said. “Last week the Republican Party came apart at the seams over those issues and others.”
With ANWR off the table, moderate Republicans said the leaders had enough support the week of Nov. 7 to pass the spending reconciliation bill, the first step in the three-step reconciliation process. But the loss of ANWR drilling and another provision that expanded offshore drilling for oil and gas in the Lower 48 quickly eroded the support of some conservative Republicans.
The legislation was further hampered by unanimous opposition from House Democrats, disappointment among business and ideologically conservative special interest groups and only token support from the White House. GOP bartering continues House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., Blunt and the rest of their leadership structure continued to work the week of Nov. 14 behind the scenes to corral the 218 votes necessary for passage of the bill.
Since House GOP leaders gave in to demands from moderates to remove ANWR and offshore provisions from the bill, House drilling supporters have been seeking a pledge from Republican leaders to fight for inclusion of the provisions as part of a final conference reconciliation plan.
Some drilling advocates say their votes for the House reconciliation measure might be contingent on this reassurance from leadership.
Rep. Mike Barton, R-Texas, and Rep. Richard Pombo, R-Calif., quickly emerged as vocal supporters of ANWR and another provision to allow drilling on the coastal shelf that was opposed by a number of Florida Republicans.
Pombo, who chairs the House Resources Committee, told reporters the decision of House GOP leaders to remove language that would authorize drilling in ANWR is “not as big of an issue right now” because similar language is in the Senate’s version of the bill. There is no similar offshore language in the Senate measure. The Senate passed its $35 billion budget reconciliation bill Nov. 3.
Pombo remains uncertain about how he will vote on the House bill and said at least 25 House drilling supporters “have told leadership that if it’s not in the conference report, then we’re a no.”
“Don’t sell us out on that one,” he added.
Rep. Elton Gallegly, R-Calif., declined to say Nov. 16 whether he would support the spending reconciliation package but said removing ANWR from the bill remained a sticking point for him because of the need for greater domestic oil independence.
“If you live in a hut without heat, or walk, or ride a bike, fine. But if not, there’s a lot of hypocrisy,” he said.
Blunt, who is also acting as House Majority Whip, said language authorizing oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge would not re-emerge in the House bill. But he declined to make a guess about what might happen when House and Senate conferees meet to write a final version of the bill. “I don’t know if it’s dead for the year, but it’s too early to worry about the conference,” he told reporters. Offshore drilling still alive Pombo and other Western lawmakers met with energy lobbyists Nov. 15 to continue planning their strategy regarding ANWR and offshore drilling.
Though ANWR drilling appears to be an issue that will remain largely dormant until conference, debate over language that allows states the right to opt out of a congressional ban on offshore oil and natural gas production remains active.
“Right now our chances are 50-50,” Pombo said late Nov. 16, adding that he had about 24 hours “to prove that I have the votes.”
The offshore drilling language pulled from the bill would allow states to opt out of congressional oil and natural gas production bans in most of the Outer Continental Shelf.
But Pombo is talking to lawmakers from Florida and other coastal areas to try to reinsert the offshore language in the House bill or find compromise language that would put the issue back in play.
Rep. Cliff Stearns, R-Fla., supports Pombo’s language and says a majority of other Florida House Republicans do as well.
But prospects for Senate approval of language expanding offshore energy production this year appear dim in light of the continued opposition of senators from Florida and other coastal states.
Opponents of expanding offshore energy production say it would harm the marine ecosystem, tourism and military testing and training. Pombo initially proposed an offshore plan that also created a 125-mile non-production buffer off Florida’s western coast, as well as a 100-mile buffer off the remainder of the state’s coast, as well as a portion of Alabama’s limited coast.
Business cool to reconciliation bill Business and industry groups with a stake in opening up new sources of domestic energy said they have not given up the fight for drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge or the Outer Continental Shelf — but a decision by House GOP leaders earlier in November to drop those provisions from the deficit reduction package appears to have dampened enthusiasm for the underlying bill.
National Association of Manufacturers lobbyist Bryan Brendle told reporters that the removal of the energy provisions in the House bill “diminishes the value of the package significantly.” He said NAM is pleased ANWR remains in the Senate version, which keeps alive the possibility the provision will be included in a conference agreement.
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