Making Emergency Supplemental Appropriations For Fiscal Year 2010 - Continued

Floor Speech

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Mr. DURBIN. If the Senator would yield for a question.

Mr. MENENDEZ. I would be happy to yield for a question.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois.

Mr. DURBIN. I would like to ask a question of the Senator from New Jersey through the Chair. I know the Senator from New Jersey has been a leader on the whole question of liability and the damages that should be paid by BP for what they have done as a result of this Deepwater Horizon rig blowing up, 11 innocent people killed. We should always remember that as the first casualty and now the ongoing damage.

I would ask the Senator from New Jersey, having just gone to the Gulf of Mexico yesterday with five of our Senate colleagues on a bipartisan trip--the Secretary of the Interior, Ken Salazar; Secretary of Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano--is it not true that in the first 3 months of this year, British Petroleum reported profits of $5 1/2 billion, up 135 percent over the first quarter of last year?

Mr. MENENDEZ. Yes. British Petroleum made about $5.6 billion in the first 3 months in profits--not proceeds, profits. Right now the liability cap that exists under the law is $75 million, 1 day of BP's profits, based on the first quarter's $94 million. So it is less than 1 day's profit.

Mr. DURBIN. If I can ask another question through the chair of the Senator from New Jersey.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois.

Mr. DURBIN. Yesterday, during the course of this visit to Louisiana, there was a very compelling moment when we met with those oystermen and fishermen and shrimpers and charter boat proprietors who were directly affected by the BP oilspill.

I would like to ask the Senator from New Jersey if he would comment or reflect on the following: There are approximately 20,000 shrimpers, crab and oyster fishermen in Louisiana alone. If the $75 million in damages were dedicated only to those seafood industry workers in that one State, it would equate to roughly $3,500 per person.

I would like to ask the Senator from New Jersey, can there be any justice in that outcome; that BP would be limited in the amount they would pay out, the $75 million, when we look at the fact that there are those in similar professions in Alabama, in Mississippi, in Florida, and other States who are not even included in this calculation, if such a small amount was all that was paid to those who have clearly been directly damaged by this spill?

Mr. MENENDEZ. Well, the Senator's question is well put. Justice could not be achieved under the present cap. As a matter of fact, as I said earlier, today the United States declared a fishing disaster in three Gulf States: Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama. Louisiana itself has a $2.4 billion seafood industry, and it supplies up to 40 percent of all of the U.S. seafood.

Clearly, just that figure alone gives us a sense that all of those individuals and communities and entities would not receive justice.

Mr. DURBIN. My last question to the Senator from New Jersey: How much should the taxpayers of America pay for the negligence and wrongdoing of British Petroleum, this multibillion-dollar corporation?

Mr. MENENDEZ. Absolutely nothing. The only way to ensure the U.S. taxpayer pays absolutely nothing, not just for the cleanup but in terms of consequences to communities that would exceed the liability cap that exists right now under the law and for which BP has made statements but no commitment, such as a consent agreement, which would be binding upon BP--the taxpayers should pay absolutely nothing--the way to do that is to raise it to an unlimited cap.

I yield the floor.

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