Reid Wants Vote on Oil Tax Breaks

Politico reports:

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid wants the full Senate to consider repealing oil and gas industry tax incentives next month.

Reid is backing President Barack Obama’s effort to repeal roughly $4 billion in annual tax incentives for the industry — and potentially move that money toward renewable and clean energy projects.

He will bring up such a plan “as soon as I can do it procedurally in the Senate here,” he told reporters in a conference call Wednesday.

Obama — in a letter to congressional leaders Tuesday — said one way to address gas prices is eliminating those industry incentives and “invest that revenue into clean energy to reduce our dependence on foreign oil.”

Reid said Obama sent a “good letter.”

Republicans and industry officials have strongly pushed back at attempts to scale back these incentives, arguing that the way to address gas prices is by increasing and quickening domestic energy production.

Reid referenced the attempt to curb the industry incentives in response to a question regarding his agenda to deal with gas prices. He did not reference anything else regarding gas prices as part of the agenda for the next congressional work period.

Democrats have other ideas — including “use it or lose it” legislation that aims to force companies to use existing drilling leases or risk losing those and future leases. They are also highlighting alleged manipulation and excessive speculation in the financial oil markets.

House Republicans next week plan to bring up legislation from Natural Resources Committee Chairman Doc Hastings (R-Wash.) that would expedite the permitting of offshore drilling projects to 30 days for those projects the Obama administration had already approved prior to last year's Gulf of Mexico oil spill.