Obama: Oil, Gas Subsidies Must Come to an End
President Barack Obama made his latest plea to end tax breaks for big oil companies Thursday while campaigning in New Hampshire.
During a speech at Nashua Community College, Obama called on Congress to put an end to tax breaks and subsidies for major oil and gas companies.
"Right now, $4 billion of your tax dollars, $4 billion, subsidizes the oil industry every year," Obama told the students, highlighting that big oil companies are currently pulling in record profits as gas prices are going through the roof.
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"Does anyone think that Congress should give them another $4 billion this year?" Obama asked. "Let's put every single member of Congress on record: you can stand with oil companies or you can stand up for the American people."
The oil industry has become a topic of much heated debate over the last several years with climate change concerns, increasingly high prices for oil, and peak oil on the decline. The Obama Administration has been central to this debate and both Republicans and Democrats have offered different solutions to the energy problem facing the United States and the world.
"You can keep subsidizing a fossil fuel that's been getting taxpayer dollars for a century, or you can place your bets on a clean energy future," Obama added.
Just last week, Obama was in Miami, Fla., to give a speech on energy policy at the University of Miami.
"We absolutely need safe, responsible oil production here in America," the president said while promising to work toward a policy of making a majority of U.S. and gas resources available.
President Obama additionally promised to take "the next steps towards energy exploration in the Artic" and told the audience that under his administration, "America is producing more oil today than at any time in the last eight years."
