Nationwide Consumer and Fuel Retailer Choice Act of 2025

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Ms. CRAIG. Mr. Speaker, I thank Ranking Member Pallone for yielding.

As co-chair of the bipartisan Biofuels Caucus, this has been a longtime coming. Getting year-round E15 across the finish line has been a priority of mine since the day I came into Congress. In fact, I led the charge for Democrats when we were in control of the House in 2022, the only other time that year-round E15 has passed the House of Representatives.

Back then, the farm economy wasn't great, but now it is downright terrible. Farm bankruptcies in the Midwest are up 70 percent year over year. Our family farmers are hurting, and so are our working families in this country.

Tariffs and trade wars have shut corn and soybean farmers out of their largest markets, and the war in Iran is hitting every single person I know in the pocketbook when it comes to gas prices.

We have the opportunity today to expand market opportunities for farmers who badly need them while at the same time lowering costs at the pump.

Make no mistake about it: It is going to lower costs to allow for year-round E15 if the adoption rate goes up as retailers put in more infrastructure at the pump so that people will have broader access to year-round E15.

But the dynamics of the policies in this country are not changing today. As we think about the administration, the tariffs, the war in Iran, the Strait of Hormuz and the problems we have there, fertilizer costs, diesel costs--we can stand here all day long and say this is a good bipartisan bill, and I believe it is. In 2022, we passed a bipartisan bill. But until this administration changes its actual policies that impact family farmers, there is going to be pain throughout farm country.

As we think about E15 and biofuels in our country, E15 is homegrown, renewable, and available. All we are asking to put into law is that we not arbitrarily limit this cheaper option for consumers to a few months out of the year. In fact, what we are putting in place today, should this pass, is a status quo because we are seeing waivers every single year anyway.

Let's make it available to any American anytime they want to choose it. Year-round E15 is a win for consumers, and it is a win for farmers who desperately need these domestic markets because of so many bad policies on the part of this current administration.

I urge my colleagues to support this package, to support our family farmers and working people across this country.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source