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Republican's oil spill gaffe hands advantage back to administration
A senior Republican gift-wrapped a gaffe about the oil spill and handed it to President Barack Obama on Thursday, ceding the GOP’s advantage on a disaster that has plagued the administration for weeks and called its competence into question.
Rep. Joe Barton (Texas), the top GOP lawmaker on the House energy
committee, apologized to BP and accused the White House of a “$20
billion shakedown” for forcing the oil company to set up a vast cleanup
and compensation escrow fund to pay for the spill’s damages.
Republican leaders, caught flat-footed, immediately distanced
themselves from Barton, who told a congressional hearing that he was
“ashamed” of the Obama administration’s treatment of BP.
“It is a tragedy of the first proportion that a private corporation
can be subjected to what I would characterize as a shakedown, in this
case a $20 billion shakedown,” Barton said during opening remarks at
the Energy and Commerce Committee hearing where Hayward was giving
testimony.
The top three House Republican leaders condemned Barton’s apology,
while Rep. Jeff Miller (R-Fla.), whose Pensacola district is among
those areas hardest-hit by the oil spill in the Gulf, issued a
statement that called on Barton to step down from his position as
ranking member of the committee. The spot would set Barton up for the
plum chairmanship next year if Republicans were to win control of
Congress this fall.
Hayward’s testimony before the committee took an immediate backseat
to the controversy over Barton’s statement on a day in which
Republicans sought to hammer away at the Obama administration for its
response to the spill in the Gulf.
For his part, Hayward said he “certainly didn’t think it was a slush fund.”
“As we said yesterday, the fund is a signal of our commitment to do
right to ensure ... everyone who’s been impacted by this is kept
whole,” he said during his lengthy appearance before the panel. “That
is what I’ve said from the beginning of this, and that’s what we intend
to do.”
Under intense pressure from his own leadership, upon his return to
the hearing on Thursday afternoon, Barton apologized for any
“misconstruction of his comments.”
Less than an hour later, his office issued a more formal written
apology that a leadership aide said was run through GOP Leader John
Boehner’s (Ohio) office for approval.
“I apologize for using the term ‘shakedown’ with regard to
yesterday’s actions at the White House in my opening statement this
morning, and I retract my apology to BP,” Barton said. “I regret the
impact that my statement this morning implied that BP should not pay
the consequences of their decisions and actions in this incident.”
Boehner and GOP Whip Eric Cantor (Va.) threatened to strip Barton of
his perch as ranking member of the Energy and Commerce Committee,
according to a leadership aide.
The two leaders told Barton at an early-afternoon meeting to
“apologize, immediately. Or you will lose your position, immediately,”
the aide said.
Barton, who briefly challenged Boehner for GOP leader after the 2006
elections, is skeptical that man-made carbon emissions are warming the
earth's climate. The biography on his website touts a Wall Street
Journal article describing him as the "House GOP's leading expert on
energy policy."
Miller described a fiery scene when he approached Boehner to say he
would be calling for Barton to resign as Energy’s ranking member. He
said Reps. Jo Bonner (R-Ala.) and Sue Myrick (R-N.C.) also participated
in the heated discussion on the House floor.
“Oh, they are furious,” Miller said in an interview with The Hill,
noting that Bonner, the top-ranking Republican on the ethics panel, is
“the calmest guy in the legislative body.”
Boehner, Cantor and Republican Conference Chairman Mike Pence (Ind.) issued a statement that Barton’s comments “were wrong.”
“BP itself has acknowledged that responsibility for the economic
damages lies with them and has offered an initial pledge of $20 billion
for that purpose,” the trio said.
Democrats, meanwhile, saw the gaffe as a major opportunity to shift
the dialogue on the oil spill, an issue on which Obama’s approval
rating had been flagging, and on which they had sought traction to
advance an energy and climate bill yet this year.
The White House quickly pounced on Barton, and put pressure on other Republicans to reject the comments.
At the daily press briefing, Vice President Joe Biden called
Barton’s comments “incredibly insensitive, incredibly out of touch.”
“There’s no shakedown,” Biden said. “It’s insisting on responsible conduct and a responsible response to a problem they caused.”
White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said: “Members from both parties should repudiate his comments.”
Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said Barton’s comments were part of a Republican pattern.
“I think it’s important to note that it was not inconsistent with
comments made by the chairman of the Republican Study Committee, part
of the Republican leadership, Rep. Tom Price [Ga.],” Pelosi said at her
weekly press conference.
In a Wednesday statement, Price said, “BP’s reported willingness to
go along with the White House’s new fund suggests that the Obama
administration is hard at work exerting its brand of Chicago-style
shakedown politics.
“These actions are emblematic of a politicization of our economy
that has been born out of this administration’s drive for greater power
and control.”
Pelosi said Barton’s comments “fit comfortably among the leadership of the Republicans in the House of Representatives.”
The congressman’s comments were “a pivot point in the BP oil spill,”
Democratic National Committee communications director Brad Woodhouse
wrote in an e-mail to reporters.
“Republicans have a plan,” he said. “Politicize the oil spill. Apologize to BP. Turn their backs on the Gulf Coast.”
Sam Youngman, Jared Allen and Ben Geman contributed to this article.
This story was updated at 3:25 p.m and at 8:11 p.m.
—Sam Youngman contributed to this report.
