Hire More Heroes Act of 2015

Floor Speech

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Mr. BARRASSO. Madam President, last week a bipartisan majority of Senators--Members of this body--voted to try to stop President Obama's dangerous and desperate deal with Iran--that is right, dangerous and desperate.

The President wants to give Iran relief from the economic sanctions the world imposed. I believe President Obama traded away these sanctions too readily and he got too little in return. These sanctions included limits on the sale of Iranian oil. According to one estimate, Iran could soon begin to export as many as 1 million additional barrels of oil each and every day. I know the money Iran makes from these sales will go to shoring up its economy, and it will go to building up Iran's military. Some of it will undoubtedly go to supporting global terrorists. That is what President Obama traded away. Iran will be allowed to sell its oil anywhere in the world, yet American oil producers are largely prohibited from selling American oil anywhere in the world. Apparently, that is exactly the way the White House wants to keep things.

There is legislation working its way through Congress right now to lift the ban on American crude oil exports. The Obama administration has said it doesn't support the bill. There is bipartisan support of the bill but not this White House--oh no. They think Congress shouldn't even get to decide. They think it should be up to Washington bureaucrats in the Obama administration to make the decisions. The administration thinks they are the only ones who should be allowed to decide whether the oil export ban gets lifted.

It was the Obama administration that let Iran off the hook by signing such a terrible deal. It is the Obama administration that now wants to lift the sanctions and give Iran access to more than $100 billion. Should the Obama administration be the one to decide whether Iran gets to sell its oil without American competition? Is that what the President wants? Why is the Obama administration so interested in making sure Iran's economy gets back on its feet faster?

The President ought to be focused on helping America's economy, not Iran's economy. Right now American producers export about 500,000 barrels of oil a day. Where does it go? It goes to Canada. Iran is exporting about 1 million barrels a day. But once President Obama lifts the sanctions, that number is going to jump to almost 2 million barrels a day--2 million barrels a day. So President Obama favors a situation where Iran will be allowed to export four times as much oil as America does--four times as much. That is what the President is in favor of. And Senate Democrats who voted to help the President lift the sanctions want the same thing. That is what they say, 4 to 1--Iran over the United States.

Republicans want something very different. If the export ban is lifted, U.S. energy producers could export another 1.6 million barrels a day. Our daily oil exports would jump from half a million barrels to about 2 million barrels. That is what we want, to lift the sanctions. At the same time, Republicans voted to keep the sanctions in place against Iran. So under Republican plans, America would be exporting twice as much oil as Iran.

The Democrats vote four for Iran, one for the United States, and Republicans voted two for the United States, one for Iran. That is the difference between what Washington Democrats want and what Senate Republicans want.

The Brookings Institution looked at this in September of 2014. They came out with a report. They looked at a variety of different scenarios for how much oil America might export. They found that for every scenario they looked at, ``there are positive gains for U.S. households,'' with the United States being able to export more crude oil. The Government Accountability Office said the same thing last year. It said that ``removing export restrictions is expected to increase the size of the economy''--that is the U.S. economy--``with implications for employment, investment, public revenue and trade.''

Those are key for America.

These studies and others predict that adding American crude oil to global supplies could ultimately reduce gasoline prices right here at home. By how much, you ask? Well, one study estimated it would save American consumers a combined average of almost $6 billion per year. This study found the savings would help increase the U.S. economy by about $38 billion by 2020. New oil exports could support an additional 300,000 jobs by 2020.

These are huge benefits for the American economy, for American families--all because we free up American energy and we allow it to compete in the world's markets.

There would also be benefits for America's foreign policy. More oil would reduce prices worldwide. That means the other countries that export a lot of oil won't be able to make as much money off of their own oil sales. They would have to compete with us. This includes Iran. It includes countries such as Russia and Venezuela that use the wealth from their energy sales to pilot their own economies and not for the good.

New oil exports would undercut the ability of those countries to do things that are not in America's best interest. It would also help American allies around the world. Poland gets 96 percent of its oil from Russia. When they are negotiating to buy more oil, they would love--love--the opportunity and the option of American oil as an alternative. Belgium gets 60 percent of its oil from Russia and Saudi Arabia. Japan gets 75 percent of its oil from Russia and the Middle East. All of these countries and many more around the world could benefit from U.S. oil being sold on the world market.

Of course, another country that would really be helped is Israel. President Obama's reckless deal with Iran has put Israel in a much more dangerous situation. Even the White House seems to recognize this. The Obama administration says that it plans to offer Israel more military aid--aid to be used to bolster Israel's defenses against Iran. But the administration should not stop at military aid; it should also offer Israel the opportunity to import American oil. Israel has trouble buying oil from many of its neighboring countries because they do not recognize the State of Israel. That leaves places such as Russia and Iraqi Kurdistan as its largest suppliers of crude oil.

If the Israelis had the opportunity to buy from American oil producers instead, that would be a big help in making sure their oil supply is stable and secure. It would also help repair some of the significant damage the President's Iran deal did to the relations between our two countries.

This should be an easy call. Ending the ban on U.S. oil exports would be good for American families, good for our national security, and good for our allies. The Obama administration should change course now. The Obama administration should work with Congress to end this ban on American energy exports as quickly as possible.

This past Saturday marked 7 years since a Canadian company filed its application to build the Keystone KL Pipeline--7 years. It has been buried in the bureaucratic limbo of the State Department ever since. That pipeline would provide American jobs just as more oil exports would. Americans should not have to wait another 7 years for Washington to lift the oil export ban and unleash the power of American energy.

Madam President, I yield the floor.

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