Oklahoma Rep. Dan Boren says President Barack Obama is threatening thousands of Democrats' jobs by calling for an end to tax breaks for oil companies. Boren — a Democrat — also told Fox News’ Stuart Varney Wednesday most of the tax breaks do not go to big businesses, but to small independent oil-and-gas firms.
“We would lose thousands of jobs — not only in Oklahoma, [but in] Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, and places like Pennsylvania, New York, West Virginia,” Boren said. “These are not just oil and gas — traditional oil-and-gas-producing states.
“And these tax breaks do not go to the big major oil companies — they go to small independent companies like we have in Oklahoma,” he said. “Did you know a vast majority of the production in the United States comes from small independent oil-and-gas companies? And the new rigs that are being — the new rigs that are drilling right now in the United States — they are not the ExxonMobils of the world.
“They are the Devons, the Chesapeakes, and even smaller companies that are based in Oklahoma, that are employing a lot of — by the way — a lot of Democrats [in] blue-collar jobs,” Boren continued. “And the president needs to understand that.”
Varney asked whether Boren didn’t have like-minded, Blue Dog Democrat colleagues in Congress to help stop elimination of the tax breaks.
“Well, unfortunately, a lot of my colleagues lost in the last election — I mean, good people from Louisiana, Mississippi — we lost because the president has lurched too far to the left on his energy policies,” Boren replied. “He has got to come to the middle — if he wants to win this next election, he has got to win over independents.
“He may write off Oklahoma — I don`t know if he has been to Oklahoma since the last election,” Boren added. “But he should be in places like the Gulf Coast, because, I mean, people are losing their jobs every single day because of this administration’s policies.
“These are not just CEOs of major companies — these are Democrats — these are blue-collar workers in places like Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, and all the way up into places like Pennsylvania and New York,” he said.
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