Letter to the Hon. David Bernhardt, Secretary of the Interior - Carbajal, Colleagues Demand Immediate Trump Administration Withdrawal Of Any New Oil And Gas Leases Off California Coast

Letter

Dear Secretary Bernhardt:
We write in response to reports that the Department of Interior will include new oil and gas leases off
the California coast in a new Outer Continental Shelf Oil and Gas Leasing Program (Program). As
Members of Congress from the California Delegation, we stand in strong opposition to expanded oil and
gas drilling off the coast of California and urge you to remove these leases from consideration.
The inevitable onshore and offshore risks associated with offshore drilling impact public health, the
environment, and our climate. For these reasons, every single coastal governor along the Atlantic and
Pacific coasts, Republican and Democrat alike, has stood in opposition to offshore drilling. In coastal
communities, where livelihoods are built around fishing, tourism, and recreation, it is critically
important to guard against oil leaks or spills that could harm these ocean dependent economies and
fragile marine ecosystems.
Because of the loud outcry from communities like these, President Donald Trump issued a ten-year
moratorium on offshore drilling in waters off Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina in September--just
three months ago.
We in California are all too familiar with the impacts of offshore oil drilling. The 1969 oilspill off the
coast of Santa Barbara, California, at the time was the largest oil spill in the United States. This tragedy
killed thousands of marine mammals,fish, and birds, and oil washed up on the beaches for hundreds of
miles along Central and Southern California. There have been no new oil and gas leases in California
State waters since this time, more than 50 years, and no federal leases off California for more than 35
years.
This year marks 10 years since BP's Deepwater Horizon oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico and offshore
oil drilling is no safer today than it was then. We will continue to work in Congress to protect our
coastal communities, ocean ecosystems, and fight global climate change. It is imperative that there is no
new oil and gas leasing off California's Coast, and we demand the immediate withdrawal of new oil and
gas leasing off California from consideration in any future Program.

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