Pence Discusses the Gulf Coast Oil Spill on Fox and Friends and Morning Joe

Statement

U.S. Congressman Mike Pence went on FOXNews' Fox and Friends and MSNBC's Morning Joe this morning to discuss the Gulf Coast Oil Spill:

Fox and Friends

Excerpts:

"We'll get out to the site with a delegation of Republican Members of Congress. It's starting to look more and more like the environment will recover, the Gulf will recover, but it's much less certain that the economy of the Gulf will recover because of the imposition of the drilling moratorium by the Obama Administration. The reality is that we hope and pray that maybe when we're out of the site today that the static kill will take effect. It'll get the mud down there and will seize the thing up in a way that is going to begin the process of permanently sealing it.

"But this six-month maybe ad infinitum moratorium on drilling is killing this economy. We'll hear from one expert this morning - an economist who produced a study that he said that in the six months of the moratorium its cost more than 8,000 jobs here in the region. There have been other estimates of many multiples of that so what we've already heard since we've arrived in New Orleans yesterday is, "Yes, we want the follow-up to make sure that we're protecting the environment. But for heaven's sake get this moratorium lifted, and lifted now and let this region come back economically just as the environment has a chance to come back now.'"

"The Democrats last week actually brought a bill to the floor of the Congress that would raise taxes on domestically produced oil and natural gas -- I think two dollars per barrel - that would drive us to more dependence on foreign oil and you combine that with the moratorium on deep-water drilling in the Gulf and the fact that some rigs have already headed out to other parts of the world.

"This administration has a policy of greater dependence on foreign sources of oil. The Republican plan in the American Energy Act, that many of us that are traveling to New Orleans today helped to draft, gives the American people more access to American oil and natural gas in an environmentally responsible way; develops wind, solar, and nuclear; encourages conservation through tax incentives. That's the real answer, not more taxes and a really mind-boggling moratorium on domestic production here in the Gulf."

Morning Joe

Excerpts:

"Well, what we're finding is, obviously, the tourism industry in Mississippi and Florida have been dramatically impacted. But here in New Orleans, what we heard last night and when we talked to locals, when we met with BP officials, is that here, which is really the center of the oil production economy, that not only has the oil spill and its impact really devastated this area, but frankly, the Obama administration's moratorium on drilling is killing jobs in this region.

"We'll meet this morning with Professor John Mason who produced a comprehensive study that said that in the Gulf of Mexico at large there are more than 8,000 jobs that will be lost in the six months just directly related to the moratorium on drilling. I don't think it can be justified any longer. We fought last week for a wholesale lifting of the moratorium. Thanks to the use of dispersants and aggressive action in the water, it looks like we're mitigating the impact on the environment so it's going to be able to recover, but we don't know if the economy is going to be able to recover with the moratorium, Joe."

"I trust what the EPA said yesterday when they said that, in fact, the use of Corexit in the region did not represent a significant environmental hazard and certainly not as great a hazard as potentially 5 million barrels of oil going into the region. I mean, look, this Corexit basically operates the same way the detergent in the sink when you're doing your dishes operates. It breaks up the oil and gets it to a place where bio degradation can happen and the absence of significant tracks of oil being able to be found at this hour is widely credited, what we're hearing, with the aggressive use of dispersants.

"The EPA delayed the use of dispersants for about three weeks but thanks to Thad Allen's decision-making process, it was approved and put forward and, frankly, Joe, I think the use of dispersants is one of the reasons why we're going to see a significant mitigation of the impact on the environment. But again, I want to go back and what you hear down here in New Orleans is that the moratorium is killing jobs and the Obama administration's got to lift it now."

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