The following article, Is the Oil Lobby Working to Implement a Carbon Tax Behind the Scenes?, was first published on Big League Politics.
According to a report by the Daily Caller, America’s strongest oil and gas lobby is working in the shadows with squishy House Republicans to build support for a bill that critics believe could lay the groundwork for the implementation of a domestic carbon tax.
On May 14, Chris Boness, the director of federal relations at the American Petroleum Institute (API), sent out an email to an API mailing list that listed multiple House elected officials planning to co-sponsor the PROVE IT Act in addition to the Republican Congressman from Utah John Curtis. The trade organization has held meetings with staffers to attempt to pick up support for the bill, which API back, per sources close to the issue.
The bill would allegedly instruct the Department of Energy (DOE) to review the carbon intensity of goods such as aluminum, steel, plastic and crude oil that are produced in the United States and the carbon intensity of products originating from other countries, per E&E News.
Countless critics of the PROVE IT Act have described the bill as a potential “gateway” to domestic carbon taxes because it would effectively direct the federal government to calculate an implicit cost of carbon with few limits on how that official metric will be used on future occasions.
“Thanks for those that joined today’s meeting,” Boness wrote in the email the Daily Caller was able to obtain. “Here is the list of current [Republican] cosponsors of the PROVE IT Act: Curtis, [Michigan Rep. Tim] Walburg (sic), [Ohio Rep. Bob] Latta, [New York Rep. Andrew] Garbarino, [Florida Rep. Maria Elvira] Salazar, [Michigan Rep. Mariannette] Miller-Meeks, [Indiana Rep. Larry] Bucshon, [Oregon Rep. Lori] Chavez-DeRemer. Additionally, [Georgia Rep. Buddy] Carter, [New York Rep. Mike] Lawler and [Pennsylvania Rep. Dan] Meuser seemed interested. Will keep you updated if others join and send updates on introduction.”
API representatives held meetings discussing the PROVE IT Act with elected officials’ offices, sources close to the issue said to the Daily Caller.
Carbon pricing is largely unpopular among Republicans, per E&E News. Generally speaking, polling shows that the issue of climate change is not very important for Republican voters. In fact, many voters on the Republican side of the aisle don’t view it as an issue that requires massive government intervention. For Republicans, having cheap, reliable energy is a much more pressing concern.
Many opponents of this bill believe that it directs the federal government to impose a price on carbon with not enough restrictions on what the government is able to do in the future.
Carbon taxes are just another way for the ruling class to attack working class Americans. If our political elites are not checked through reasonable political force, they will completely enslave the common man through bone-crushing regulations, inflation, and mass migration.
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