How Did Utah Senators Vote in Narrow Defeat of Keystone XL Pipeline?

Utah Sens. Orrin G. Hatch and Mike Lee were united in their quest to see the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline. The two Republicans have long voted yes on a proposal to build a 1,179-mile structure to transport oil from Alberta, Canada, to Steele City, Nebraska, via Montana and South Dakota.

That support continued in March 2015, when they voted to override a veto from President Barack Obama and get the project completed. A new Republican-led Congress had approved the bill in January — reversing a failed November 2014 vote — but the president's action again shot it down.

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The motion to disregard the veto went 62-37, five votes short of the 67, or two-thirds majority, that was required. The 62 votes were the same number who passed the bill in January 2015, meaning that no new additional votes were collected to override the veto.

Fifty-three of the 54 Senate Republicans (Florida Sen. Marco Rubio didn't vote) were joined by nine Senate Democrats in support of Keystone XL.

Hatch, a seven-term senator and president pro tempore of the chamber, expressed his disappointment in the veto in a statement. "The president's veto of the Keystone XL pipeline obstructs a commonsense, bipartisan approach to creating jobs and securing America's energy future," Hatch said.

"Again and again, the president has demonstrated he is accountable to no one, not even the American people. Unlike the president, who refuses to work with Congress for the good of the country, I will continue to work with my colleagues in the Senate on solutions that help the American people," Hatch continued.

Hatch and Lee were among 44 senators from both parties that introduced the January 2012 legislation to approve the Keystone XL Pipeline.

"There is absolutely no rational justification for standing in the way of profitable enterprise that would create American jobs, American wealth, and greater American energy security," Lee said in a 2012 statement.

"President Obama is kowtowing to the most extreme elements of the environmentalist movement by blocking the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, and he has the audacity to do so while calling Congress 'obstructionist.' It is time for America to reject the president's failed economic policies and embrace proven methods of job creation, and this bill is a step in the right direction," Lee continued.

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