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WYDEN RESOLUTION CALLS ON
PRESIDENT TO PUSH OPEC,
AID GASOLINE CONSUMERS
Legislation mirrors 2000 call by Abraham,
Ashcroft for White House action;
news reports indicate president
did not contact Saudis to stop new production cut
April 02, 2004
Washington,
DC – U.S.
Senator Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) today introduced a Senate resolution
calling on President Bush to pressure OPEC nations to increase
oil production to help reduce gasoline prices in the United States.
The Wyden resolution mirrors legislation authored in 2000 by
the current U.S. Energy Department secretary, then-U.S. Senator
Spencer Abraham (R-Mich.), and the current U.S. Attorney General,
then-U.S. Senator John Ashcroft (R-Mo.), calling on the Clinton
administration to pressure OPEC for higher output to stabilize
oil prices. Wyden introduced the resolution following news reports
that President Bush failed to contact Saudi Arabia, the largest
OPEC member, in advance of the oil cartel's announcement that
it would cut production by one million barrels a day at a time
when U.S. gasoline prices remain at historic highs. OPEC voted
Wednesday to proceed with that production cut.
"The substance of this resolution is identical to [the]
one introduced back on February 28, 2000 with our current Secretary
of Energy as one of the principal sponsors. Back then it was
clear that our Senate colleagues thought it was important to
put some heat on OPEC," said Wyden. "Every Administration
ought to be pushing OPEC in order to increase production. In
2004, when the Saudi foreign minister says he hasn't even been
contacted, that he heard from reporters that the Administration
was disappointed, that's not good enough for my constituents
who are consistently paying some of the country's highest gas
prices."
The 2000 Abraham-Ashcroft
resolution (S. Res. 263) called on President Clinton to "communicate to … [OPEC] and
non-OPEC countries that participate in the cartel of crude oil
producing countries … the position of the United States
in favor of increasing world crude oil supplies so as to achieve
stable crude oil prices." It passed the Senate unanimously
during the 106th Congress. The Wyden resolution makes the same
request of President Bush.
As a candidate for president
in 2000, then-Governor Bush stated that President Clinton should "get on the phone with the
OPEC cartel and say, 'We expect you to open your spigots.'" On
Thursday, Secretary Abraham testified before a U.S. House of
Representatives committee that President Bush had contacted most
OPEC leaders about the cartel's planned production cut. On the
same day, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal told the
Reuters news organization that he was not contacted.
