Obama proposes taking money from Alabama to implement Alaskan climate agenda

Oil rig off the Gulf coast (Photo: Flickr)

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration is proposing taking money from Alabama and other Gulf states and redistributing it to help fund the president’s climate agenda in Alaska.

In 2006, Congress passed the Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act (GOMESA), which created a revenue-sharing agreement for off-shore oil revenue between the federal government and Alabama, Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi. Under GOMESA, 37.5% of the revenues generated from selected oil and gas lease sales in the Outer Continental Shelf of the Gulf of Mexico is returned to the Gulf States.

In his budget proposal last year, President Obama proposed that the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management redirect the distribution away from the Gulf Coast and instead spend that money elsewhere.

In response to this proposal, Congressman Bradley Byrne (R-AL1), who represents Alabama’s coastal community in the U.S. House, sponsored a budget amendment to prohibit any effort to redirect the funds away from the Gulf Coast. It passed, successfully blocking the President’s proposal.

“Not only does (the President’s) proposal directly contradict the current federal statute, it vastly undermines the purpose of the law – to keep revenues from these lease sales in the states that supply the workforce and have the inherent risk of a potential environmental disaster,” Byrne said on the House floor last year.

“My amendment today is simple; to protect the clearly defined statute and prevent the President from using these revenue sharing agreements as a slush fund for politically-driven environmental projects across the country.”

Byrne is planning to block the President’s proposal again this year, but it won’t happen without pushback from the White House.

The Obama administration has called the GOMESA payments “unnecessary and costly” and bemoaned the fact they only go to a “handful of states.” The states argue that they are the ones who incur the risks of offshore drilling and the infrastructure costs involved, and therefore are justifiably receiving the revenue.

“I’m sick and tired of Alabama’s Gulf Coast getting shortchanged, just like what happened with the BP oil spill settlement,” Byrne told Yellowhammer. “It is repulsive that President Obama is proposing taking energy revenue from Gulf Coast off-shore drilling to use for his radical climate agenda. This money is critical to Mobile and Baldwin counties and helps us support numerous coastal restoration and infrastructure projects. This proposal, like the rest of the President’s budget, is dead-on-arrival and has no chance of ever becoming law. We defeated this absurd proposal last year, and we will do the same this year.”

If Byrne is again successful in blocking the President’s proposal, it would be another blow to his climate agenda, which the administration hopes to be a large part of its legacy.

The United States Supreme court earlier this week also granted a request by roughly two dozen states, including Alabama, to put the Obama administration’s power plant-targeting carbon rules on hold.

(h/t Fox 10)