Toomey and Feinstein At It Again (Updated)

  • Thursday, 01 October 2015 00:00

The biggest anti-ethanol crusaders in the Senate have struck again.

At a time when the ethanol industry is locking horns with the EPA on the RFS targets, Senators Pat Toomey and Dianne Feinstein once again offered a plan to dismantle the RFS.  

This time around, they advanced their plan by attaching it as an amendment to a bill that would allow oil exports that's being considered by the Senate Banking Committee. The U.S has had a ban over domestic crude oil exports since the 70s. The bill has since been passed by the Senate Banking Committee but Toomey's proposal was rejected.

The domestic drilling boom has been under threat with issues of oversupply in the global market and falling oil prices and oil producers want the ban on exports lifted to maintain current production rates.

So what does this have to do with the RFS? Absolutely nothing.

But irrelevance or wasting taxpayer dollars have never been a problem for Toomey or Feinstein.

And, as it turns out, not all domestic oil producers and refiners support the plan to lift the moratorium on exports. Two refiners in Pennsylvania (where Toomey is from) - Delta's Monroe Energy and the Carlyle Group's Philadelphia Energy Solutions are lobbying against oil exports.

If you recall, Delta and the Carlyle Group were credited in convincing policymakers in 2013 to reduce the RFS targets in 2014.

Based on that alone, one wonders who's interests Toomey is protecting when he keeps proposing these ludicrous attacks on the RFS.

Moreover, it makes the statement from his spokeswoman that Toomey "is tired of the government using corporate welfare to shower money on a favored industry and then sending the bill to the taxpayer" ironic when you consider that the senator from Pennsylvania seems deeply committed to serving the interests of certain corporations who own oil refineries.