On Tuesday, CA Governor Gavin Newsom signed “legislation to implement the strongest state-level oversight and accountability measures on Big Oil in the nation – bringing transparency to California’s oil and gas industry, shining new light on the corporations that have for decades operated in the shadows while ripping families off and raking in record profits.”
***Wait a minute! I thought President Biden set those damn high as the sky gas prices. That’s what MAGAts and their ‘news’ sources claimed, anyway. Did they lie or just too ignorant to grasp the facts?!?!
“With this legislation, we’re ending the oil industry’s days of operating in the shadows. California took on Big Oil and won. We’re not only protecting families, we’re also loosening the vice grip Big Oil has had on our politics for the last 100 years.”
-Governor Gavin Newsom
How it Works: The bill, SBx1-2, creates a dedicated, day-in and day-out, independent watchdog to root out price gouging by oil companies and authorizes the California Energy Commission (CEC) to create a penalty to hold the industry accountable. The law will go into effect on June 26, the 91st day after the end of the special session.
Assemblymember Jasmeet Bain, whose district includes CA’s anus and home to Speaker in Name Only, Kevin McCarthy, (Kern County), was the only member of the Democratic Party to vote against the bill and protect ‘Big Oil.’ Kern County is home of the state’s oil industry. Her vote appeared to annoy the Newsom administration.
Oil production has been steadily declining since the late 1980s from a combination of exhausting supplies and the state’s changing policy priorities. A state law requires California to be carbon neutral by 2045, meaning the state would remove as many carbon emissions from the atmosphere as it emits. The state’s plan to do so would reduce demand for liquid petroleum by 94% by 2045.
State regulators have banned the sale of most new gas-powered cars in California by 2035. And last year, the state Legislature approved a bill limiting where new oil wells can be drilled, providing buffer zones around homes, schools and other sensitive sites.
Newsom acknowledged Monday the importance of oil for the global economy, telling reporters: “I’m driving home tonight” and “I’m flying this weekend.”
“Oil has built the American economy, built the industrial economy, I get it,” Newsom said. “But we are transitioning. And all I’m asking for is don’t rip us off anymore.”
