WASHINGTON, DC - House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-MI) today made the following statement during House consideration of the Middle Class Tax Relief and Job Creation Act (H.R. 3630):
Text of Remarks:
“This bill does a lot of things. It has real reforms. It’s driven in large part by the unemployment reforms, extending the payroll tax cut, and it’s all paid for. Most Americans don’t really want unemployment. They want a job.
“The spectrum provisions in this bill help our first responders with the allocation of the “˜D-block’. And it creates maybe as many as 100,000 jobs. The Keystone pipeline decision is a part of this bill too. It requires the President to review and make a decision - either way - within 60 days of enactment.
“Just this morning, there were a number of press accounts that perhaps Iran will soon be conducting exercises to close the Strait of Hormuz. The Keystone pipeline will connect Canadian oil sands with refineries here in the United States, adding 20,000 private sector jobs, and perhaps as many as 118,000 indirect jobs.
“It reduces our reliance on non-North American oil, which is a good thing. And, it brings perhaps as many as a million barrels of oil a day into the United States so that we don’t have to import from someplace else.
“Canada is going to develop this no matter what and that oil is either going to come, a million barrels a day, to the United States, or it’s going to go to a place like China. We want it here.
“This is a good thing. It creates jobs. It reduces our reliance on oil from overseas, and it is something that ought to be a part of this bill, and it is, and I would urge my colleagues to support it."
