Cassidy Amendment Creating Independent Commission to Investigate Gulf Oil Spill Passes House Committee
Press Release
he House Natural Resources Committee passed Louisiana Congressman Bill Cassidy's amendment to establish a credible, independent National Commission on Outer Continental Shelf Oil Spill Prevention to investigate the Deepwater Horizon Spill and make recommendations for improving the safety of offshore energy production.
In pushing for passage of his amendment at today's hearing, Cassidy said, "Our response has to be guided by facts and not by politics or ideology" "We have a commission appointed by the president to get root causes that doesn't have anyone with expertise as to the root causes. There isn't a petroleum engineer. We want to find fact and in our finding of fact prevent this from happening again. And if that's the stated purpose of the commission then frankly it should have a petroleum engineer."
Background
Through an Executive Order, President Obama established the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling Commission to provide "recommendations on how we can prevent -- and mitigate the impact of -- any future spills that result from offshore drilling."
On June 22, the Wall Street Journal questioned the Commission's agenda, noting that "there's neither an oil nor drilling expert in the bunch. Instead, he's loaded up on politicians and environmental activists."
Similarly, the Associated Press reported on June 20 that "The panel appointed by President Barack Obama to investigate the Gulf of Mexico oil spill is short on technical experts but long on talking publically about "America's addiction to oil.' Only one of the seven commissions, the dean of Harvard's engineering and applied sciences school, has a prominent engineering background -- but it's in optics and physics."
Cassidy's Amendment
* Establishes a new bipartisan, independent National Commission on Outer Continental Shelf Oil Spill Prevention modeled after the 9/11 Commission to investigate the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and make recommendations to improve the safety of offshore energy production. The ten-member commission will be appointed equally by both parties, with the President appointing the commission's chairman and Congressional leadership appointing the remaining members
* Emphasizes the appointment of members with expertise in energy production, rig safety, and environmental protection
* Gives the commission subpoena power to get to the bottom of what happened at Deepwater Horizon
* Directs the commission to report back to Congress within 180 days
On June 30, a broad bipartisan majority passed an amendment similar to Cassidy's offered by Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY) in the Senate Energy & Natural Resources Committee, with the support of Democratic Senators Jeane Shaheen (NH), Tim Johnson (SD), Blanche Lincoln (AR), Mary Landrieu (LA), and Mark Udall (CO).
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