Nomination of Leon Rodriguez to be Director of the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, Department of Homeland Security

Floor Speech

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Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I do appreciate that. I might elaborate a little bit.

Oklahoma is not just the place where they first started hydraulic fracturing, it was done in Oklahoma in 1948, and, according to Lisa Jackson, who was the Obama-appointed EPA Director, never has there been a confirmed case of groundwater contamination.

I know we are getting strapped for time here and I regret that. I draw the Presiding Officer's attention to the chart I am holding up here.

It happens that Cushing, OK, is considered to be the crossroads of the pipelines throughout the United States. In Cushing, OK, we had I guess the only trip President Obama has ever made to Oklahoma. He came to Oklahoma. Looking in the background, there are all the tubes up there to dramatically make a statement. And that statement:

I'm directing my administration to cut through the red tape, break through the bureaucratic hurdles, and make this project a priority, to go ahead and get it done.

That is what the President said in Oklahoma. I wasn't there, but that is what he said. That is a direct quote. Then he did everything he could do to destroy the Keystone Pipeline.

He made the statement down there: I'm not going to do anything to create a problem for the southern leg that goes from Cushing down into Texas. Well, there is a reason for that. The reason is, he couldn't do it. The reason he is stopping up there, because it crosses the country line from Canada into the United States. He has some jurisdiction there. But there is nothing he could do to stop it. So he came down to tell us that he wasn't going to do that.

I have to say to the President: People in Oklahoma aren't that dumb. They know you didn't have that authority or you would have stopped it.

The portion between Canada and Cushing is the part that remains stalled. At this point I think the reason is one guy named Tom Steyer. Let me introduce him.

First, we always hear a lot of things about the Koch brothers and other people who are putting money in or are concerned about it. This actually is a statement made by this very wealthy person. I am sure he is a nice person. Tom Steyer is a multibillionaire. He is very liberal. He is from the State of California. He is a good friend of the junior Senator from California, and he has made the statement that he is going to put up $100 million to spend in campaigns of people who would do two things: one, try to resurrect the issue of global warming--which is dead. I can remember when global warming would be polled as the No. 1 or No. 2 problem in the country. Right now, according to last week's Gallup poll, it is No. 14 out of 15. So that is a dead issue.

But $100 million would do two things: first, to resurrect that issue; secondly, to stop the Keystone Pipeline.

A few weeks ago he said explicitly--and these are his words, not mine:

It is true that we expect to be heavily involved in midterm elections. We are looking at a bunch of races. My guess is that we will end up being involved in eight or more races.

We just learned this week that as the President marks his 1-year anniversary of his climate action plan, Tom Steyer is going to meet personally with him. So there is $100 million at work right there, if that is what it takes for a meeting. And we all know what the cost would be.

This is very important. One thing that has not been refuted, way back in the beginning of the whole global warming thing they talked about the cost is going to be somewhere between $300 billion and $400 billion a year. The Wharton Economics Foundation, MIT, Charles Rivers, everyone agreed with that.

The Keystone Pipeline, which Tom Steyer wants to stop, would create 42,000 jobs, and tens of thousands more would be supported in the manufacturing sector. But Keystone is just the tip of the iceberg.

If we look at this chart, No. 3, we can see all of the domestic energy resources being developed around the country right now. We are going through a shale revolution in America, and the only thing that is getting in the way is the Federal Government.

This is interesting: In the last 6 years, oil production on private and State lands is up 61 percent. On Federal land, however, oil production is down 6 percent. Now how could that be?

This map shows throughout the United States--not all in the western part. Look at New York and Pennsylvania. This is where the development is coming from, all of it on State and private land, an increase in 5 years, 5 1/2 years, of 61 percent. At the same time, on Federal land it is down by 6 percent.

The IFC International, a well-respected consulting firm, released a report last month which said U.S. companies would need to invest $641 billion of infrastructure over the next 20 years to keep up with the growing oil and gas production.

What does it mean for jobs? According to the analysis, the spending on these new pipelines alone will create 432,000 direct jobs. And that is based on a conservative estimate. That does not assume we develop all of the resources in our country. If that were included, it would be a lot more.

So keeping this from happening would be a great impact for imposing anti-energy, global warming policies. We need to build the Keystone Pipeline and provide regulatory certainty for the entire energy infrastructure sector. Without it, we will never reach energy independence.

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Mr. INHOFE. I appreciate my good friend from California thinking it over.

Anyway, 432,000 direct jobs. And when we stop and think about it, keeping it from happening would have the impact and effect of stopping us from becoming oil independent. We could do that.

The Keystone Pipeline needs to be built. We all know about the jobs. More importantly, there is not a single good reason why it shouldn't happen.

Tom Steyer's goal is to stop the oil in Canada from being developed, but he can't do it. We have seen this just in the last week. The Canadians have conversations going with China to have them accept it if we don't complete our Keystone Pipeline.

With that, I yield the floor.

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